


Homemade Dynamite

by Fallenstar126



Series: Dynamite Universe [2]
Category: Grand Theft Auto V, Rooster Teeth/Achievement Hunter/Funhaus RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe - Grand Theft Auto Setting, Background Geoff/Jack, Fake AH Crew, Gavin Free-centric, Gen, Hacker Gavin Free, Slow Build, but its a fake ah crew au of course theres background geoff/jack, it can just be read as mavin, no explicitly romantic scenes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-27
Updated: 2018-01-19
Packaged: 2018-12-07 18:59:24
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 26
Words: 40,396
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11629854
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fallenstar126/pseuds/Fallenstar126
Summary: "Don't know you super well, but I think that you might be the same as me"Gavin was trying to start fresh, in his new home, Los Santos. Besides a broken elevator, everything was going well.Until he witnessed the Fake AH Crew blowing up a bank.*Ending edited to fit better with where I want the story to go*





	1. Chapter 1

Gavin was exhausted. He had spent the past three hours moving boxes into his new apartment, and hadn’t even started unpacking. He didn’t think that it would be that much, but upon arriving at his new place, he was informed by a young woman who was red faced from running down the stairs that the elevator was busted. As he attempted to figure out other options, she just shrugged at him, and left him standing there with a now useless dolly stacked full of boxes. 

He started regretting his apartment being on the tenth floor of an eleven story building. 

Three hours later found him unloading the final box from the truck, climbing up the stairs for the last time that day, and huffing as he finally set foot on his floor. Gavin started down the hall, mumbling to himself about his shitty time, when he heard the soft noise of the elevator doors opening. He turned around, and caught sight of a young man exiting the very much functional elevator. “What?!” He exclaimed, adjusting his hold on the cardboard box. 

The man turned towards him, surprised that someone else was there. They just stared at each other for a second before Gavin thought to explain. “But it’s broken!” 

“Uh. No?” The other man replied, looking back at the elevator, which door’s still were open invitingly. “It just brought me up here. So.” He turned back to Gavin, who was seriously struggling with the weight of the box at this point. “You also might want to put that down if you’re going to be standing there much longer.” 

“But she said it was busted!” Gavin insisted again, and the man just shook his head. 

“Whatever you say dude, I’m going to just leave you to this.” He stated, then moved past Gavin down the hall. Right to the apartment door next to his. 

And that’s how Gavin met his new neighbor. 

Once he was alone in the hallway again, he huffed to himself. “Bullocks.” He glared back at the elevator, which had finally slide closed, and continued down the hallway to his own door, letting himself in. 

He set the box down in the entryway, and surveyed his apartment. He tried to think of a plan of attack on the random assortment of boxes he had laying around, but eventually gave up. He was too exhausted at this point, and decided to loaf on the sofa for a few minutes. 

Thankfully, he hadn’t had to carry that up the stairs. The upside of buying an already furnished apartment was that he didn’t have to shop for new furniture, or worse, ship his own overseas for his new place. 

He grabbed his laptop, the only thing he hadn’t packed away in a box, and opened the screen. It lit up the small area around him, and he was greeted with loud music playing that he had forgotten to pause. 

After pausing that, he pulled up twitter, and started scrolling. When he next looked up from his laptop screen, his apartment was dark. “Well, guess that’s enough of that.” He said outloud to the room. The boxes didn’t reply. 

Finding his way across the apartment to a light switch, lit only from his laptop was a trip, but he managed it, only banging his foot a couple times against the soft cardboard boxes around him. Once the light was on, he collected the box he recognized with his bedroom things, and tugged it with him across the apartment until he entered the bedroom. 

Sleep came easy that night. 

The next morning, his arms were killing him from the second he woke up, and as much as he wanted to put it off again, Gavin knew he had to get unpacking, so he could get his computer setup and start work. He had already been neglecting it for a little too long. 

Unpacking took up the majority of the whole day, and by the time he got the chance to step away, it was already dark outside. Only then, did his stomach decided to speak up and growled aggressively. 

So, Gavin set out to find a restaurant in the area. Thankfully, his apartment was in the downtown area, and found a pizza shop right across the street from the bank. As he sat down to eat, he glanced out the window and watched the traffic go by. It was nice to just sit and relax while eating, since he hadn’t really stopped at all that day. Getting his computer setup had taken a little longer than he thought it would, probably due to the unorganized packing job that he had done. 

A while after he sat down, he watched an old car roll up by the bank, with someone hanging off the side. Odd enough, but once he watched four other people pile out of the car, it made sense. Shrugging, he went back to his pizza, which was dwindling. The pizza seemed to be more greasy than he would have liked, but overall, not too bad. 

About ten minutes later, he heard police sirens in the distance, and glanced back up out the window. It seemed the sirens were getting closer, so he figured they were likely going to come through this area. He never was much of a snoop, but like everyone, if they were going right through, it didn’t hurt to have a look. 

The police car did end up coming through, and in fact came to a stop in front of the bank. It only took a couple minutes for the street to be swarming with cops. Gavin noticed the only car left that wasn’t a police vehicle was the old Roosevelt. 

Gavin, feeling a little unnerved by the police presence, stood to leave the area, and likely just head back to his apartment. The teenage girl behind the counter seemed equally bothered, staring out the window as she wiped down the counter. “Jesus, what could be going on out there?” Gavin commented quietly to the girl, and she nodded, a worried look on her face. 

“I just hope it’s not that crew. They haven’t been doing much-” She was cut off by the sound of bullets coming from the direction of the bank. A couple seconds later, the large picture window at the front of the store shattered in a wave of bullets. The girl screamed and ducked under the counter. Seconds later, Gavin joined her, leaping over the counter. 

The girl was breathing a bit too heavy to be safe, but Gavin was more concerned about what was going on outside. The bullets kept coming, but they didn’t seem directed towards the pizza shop any longer, so Gavin peeked over the counter. “Don’t go out there.” The girl whispered between heavy breaths. 

“Don’t worry, I know how to deal with these kind of things.” Gavin commented quickly, keeping low. He watched as the police cowered behind their vehicles as a seemingly endless wave of bullets came their way. Through this, he also observed the five men who had emerged from the Roosevelt dart from the door of the bank to their car, loaded down with bags. The car started, and Gavin watched the man who was still hanging off the side of the car pull a remote from his pocket. 

He only had a few seconds to duck back under the counter, pulling the girl lower with him. She only had a second to question him before there was a large explosion. He could barely hear her scream over the sound. 

Gavin held her down for another minute after the explosion stopped, and the only sound was her choking crying, which was muffled against her arm. When he did finally let up, he could only hear glass breaking outside, and figured it was safe to look back over the counter. 

The girl stayed curled up on the ground, but Gavin wasn’t concerned about her right now. The Roosevelt was rolling past the window, where a blown out police car had tipped over on its side. He got a glance of the back of the man hanging off the side of the car. A wolf snarling from the back of the man's jacket was the first thing that caught his eye, and then he was gone. 

Gavin watched for a couple more seconds, mesmerized by the destruction around him. He stood when he thought it to be safe, and looked over the counter. Glass had made it all the way to the counter, and he was honestly surprised that it had held as it had. The girl stood on shaking legs. She seemed shocked into silence, but her breath was still shaking. 

“Do you live around here?” He asked slowly. He wasn’t used to dealing with people after this kind of thing. The girl took a couple seconds, but nodded. “Do you drive or walk?” She swallowed before answering. 

“I rode my bike today.” She replied, slowly, taking deep breaths between every word. She was still shaking violently, clutching the counter to keep upright. Gavin was itching to get back to his computer, as he had noticed a security camera across the street that he hoped wasn’t too burnt up. 

“Can you get home on that like this?” He asked skeptically, but she nodded. He was inclined to not believe her, but she also wasn’t his responsibility. So, he left her there, and booked it out of the pizza shop. He could hear more sirens in the distance, so he didn’t want to stick around for too long. 

Getting back to his place took about half the time as it had taken to get there. About twenty police cars drove by him as he slowed his run to a light jog. 

He had a lot of work to do.


	2. Chapter 2

A week later found him with an increasing collection on the infamous “Fake AH Crew”. He had managed to hack into the city wide surveillance cameras, and found the specific camera that had recorded the incident. He had collected the footage from all angles he could find, and wiped it from the cameras. He had managed this within the first half hour after getting home. The rest of the week was spent following the other Fake AH Crew heists, and eventually, Gavin had a hefty portfolio. 

The police were also seemingly mystified by the sudden loss of security footage from around the city. 

This week had been busy, and he hadn’t left his apartment in the same amount of time. He figured it would be good to get out, and see how the city was recovering from the explosion, maybe pick up some groceries. 

He didn’t even want to admit it to himself, but he also wanted to check in on that girl. While locking the door to his apartment, his neighbor also emerged from his apartment. Gavin glanced over, and actually got a good look at the guy this time. The man had brown, curly hair, and sunglasses covered his eyes. He seemed like just an average guy at this point, so Gavin figured now was probably a good time to introduce himself to his new neighbor.

“Hey, I just moved in about a week ago or so. I’m Gavin.” He slid his key into his pocket and held out a hand for the guy to shake. The guy met his hand with a nod, and a short, gruff, “Michael.” As they shook. 

“You yelled at me about the elevator, right?” He questioned, and Gavin nodded. 

“Yeah, this broad told me it was broken, and I had spent the past few hours unloading my moving boxes.” Gavin explained finally, and Michael nodded. They stood for a couple more seconds in the hallway, until eventually Michael spoke up. 

“So, I gotta head out. You taking the elevator this time?” Gavin agreed, and they turned to walk down the hallway. “So, you’re from England, right?” Michael questioned as they walked, trying to make conversation. They spoke about where Gavin had come from while waiting for the elevator, and when it arrived, Gavin led Michael into it, punching in the first floor. They continued chatting as they made their way down. 

Michael seemed nice enough, but Gavin didn’t dare bring up what he had been doing for the past week. When he inquired as to what Gavin did back in England, he just made up some tech company, and left it at IT support. He followed Michael out of the elevator, glancing over at the back of his jacket where a design could be see. 

A wolf snarled at him, and Gavin’s blood ran cold. He stopped just outside the elevator, and Michael turned back curiously. He tore his eyes away from the jacket back to the others face. “I forgot my phone.” He blurted out, and retreated back into the elevator, frantically punching the ‘close doors’ button. His mind was running at a thousand miles a second as he made his way back to his apartment. He hadn’t really forgotten his phone, but he had needed to get out of there before he ran his mouth as he always did. 

Michael was a part of the crew. 

No, that was impossible to be sure of yet. Gavin was sure that he could find that jacket online in seconds if he tried hard enough. Michael was probably just a regular guy, who owned the apartment next to him, and spent hours playing video games just like everybody else. 

Running a hand through his hair, he paced his apartment, trying to slow his breathing. It was likely just a coincidence, he couldn’t jump to any conclusions. What he could do, however, was research. 

Two hours later, he was even more exhausted than he was before, and even less information on this crew. He was right, the jacket was easy to find online, and while doing so, he discovered an entire community that followed the actions of this crew, and seemed to fawn over them like celebrities. He couldn’t help but compare it to Charles Manson in his mind. 

Gavin stepped back from his computer. It was hours later, Michael surely was gone by now, and he really did have to go grocery shopping. So he left his apartment, looking down the hall and surely looking like a crazy person. It’s not that he really believed that Michael would hurt him, or that he was in anyway involved in what happened the previous week. 

Luck was not on the same side as his paranoia however, and as the elevator doors opened, Michael was just entering the building.

Wearing a navy blue jacket with a distinct lack of wolf. 

He managed to hold back his disbelief, instead just nodding as they passed each other in the hall. The second he made it out of the doors and out of view from the apartment, Gavin ran a hand through his hair and let out the breath that he didn’t realize that he was holding. 

Maybe it was the lack of sleep, food, or any form of social interaction from the past week. Maybe he was seeing things. There had to be some explanation.

He rubbed his eyes against the evenings setting sun, and shook his head. He needed to put them out of his mind for a bit. Gavin just needed to calm down. 

Grocery shopping took about an hour, and by the end, Gavin was weighed down by the amount of bags he was carrying. However heavy the bags were, however, curiosity was killing him as he turned away from his apartment towards downtown. It only was about a five minute walk from where he was, so he didn’t think it would take too long. 

Downtown looked unchanged, aside from the boarded up windows. He noticed the pizza shop he had been hiding in seemed to have taken the most amount of damage in the area, with the sign still showing burn marks. 

By the time he got home, it was dark, but he was starving, so he pulled out one of the many microwave dinners that he had bought that day, and stuck it in the oven. While it was cooking, he sat on the edge of the counter while scrolling through his phone. His mind started to wonder back to the earlier incident, and Michael in general. Part of him started typing the name into Google, but he realized he didn’t know anything about this guy besides his first name, and that he lived in the same apartment as him. 

He erased the Google search, and instead pulled up the live camera feed from outside his apartment. Years ago he had coded an app for these types of things, where it recorded up to 48 hours in the past so he could go back if he missed anything. 

To pass the time before his food was ready, he went back in the feed a couple hours and watched the people come and go, occasionally finding a person that sparked his interest, and he switched feeds until they arrived wherever they were going. 

It was a slow night for him, but he had a course of action for the next few days, if only to stifle his curiosity. 

The next night found him knocking on Michael's door, and just hoping that the other answered. When they did, it didn’t seem like he was interrupting anything, the silence from the others apartment looming over them. “Uh. Hi?” Michael asked, holding the door so that Gavin couldn’t see into the apartment. He understood that, and didn’t fault the other for it. 

“Hi. I was wondering if you wanted to have some bevs and play Halo. I just moved to the city, and I don’t really have anyone to talk to.” Gavin blurted out. He usually wasn’t this nervous, he was typically an outgoing person, but this wasn’t him trying to make a friend. As much as he didn’t want to admit it, he did have an alternative agenda here. 

“Bevs?” Michael questioned, stepping out of his apartment, intrigued. Gavin nodded, and held up the beer he was holding in his hand. The connection hit Michael a couple seconds later and he nodded. “Sure. I’ll be over in a few, just gotta finish up some work things.” 

They parted ways, and Gavin stored that information away in his head for later. As Michael’s door was closing, he heard the other start talking “Sorry, that was a neighbor-”, but was cut off as the door closing echoed down the hall. Gavin wasn’t sure if this information meant anything to his investigation, but he quickly wrote it down on his phone anyway. 

This might take a lot longer than he had anticipated.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm so bad at keeping to a schedule, I almost posted this chapter on Tuesday


	3. Chapter 3

Michael came over a few minutes later, and Gavin was sure that his apartment was cleansed of anything related to the crew. He left his phone in his bedroom, to hid the last little chance of Michael finding out what he was trying to do. 

As far as it seemed, they were just going to drink and play video games until one of them got too drunk to properly play anymore. You know, like friends do. 

The night went well for the first couple hours, Gavin and Michael sitting in relative silence as they concentrated on the game in front of them, occasionally mumbling about something on screen, or cracking a joke about a particularly ridiculous objective in the game. It felt casual, and that’s when Gavin knew to strike. 

“So Michael?” He spoke, hating how his accent leaked into his words now that the booze had wrapped itself around his tongue. However, hopefully that meant it was having the same effect on Michael. 

“What’s up?” The other replied, seemingly less drunk, but still a little more open with his words. 

“What do you do? Like, I see you leaving and coming back at random times, it doesn’t seem like a normal nine to five, right?”

“No, it’s not really. I’m a freelance demolitions expert. Construction, you know?” Gavin tucked this piece of information away in the recesses of his mind, just in case the next morning was a little more rough on his head than he figured. Gavin nodded, trying to look interested as Michael explained the in’s and outs of freelancing with demolitions for a couple seconds, before the curly haired man turned to him. 

“What do you do? You seem to just. Stay in your apartment. Like I know you’re IT, but why don’t you have to go to an office or some shit?” Gavin almost choked on the beer he had sipped, cursing himself for not being more discreet about his work. He wasn’t used to his neighbors noticing these things.

“I work for a company overseas, providing I.T. support, I connect to them remotely whenever they have ” He replied, swallowing past the lump the beer had created in his throat. He couldn’t help but brag a little. “I was pretty much the best person they had over there for this stuff, but I wanted to branch out, so I moved to the states, but it seems like they’re struggling over there without me.” Michael grunted sympathetically. 

“Man, that sucks.” They were quiet for a second, until Michael decided to change the subject. “The city’s pretty nice, you should try to get out someday, look around.” Gavin thought about mentioning his walk around town a couple weeks ago, but thought better of it. It would easily lead to talking about the crew, and he knew better than that. 

“Yeah, that might be nice. We should go bar hopping sometime, Michael!” Gavin’s voice shot up into his higher range when his character was shot, and Michael let out a little laugh at his misfortune. 

“Holy shit dude, you’re fucking terrible at this game.” 

“It’s not my fault Michael, he came out of nowhere!” Gavin yelped as he respawned and immediately ran into a tree. Michael started laughing again, leaning back on the sofa. It seemed like once he knew Gavin was just a tech nerd, he had calmed down, as Gavin didn’t really pose any physical threat to him. Casual conversation flowed much more easy now, as Michael began to mock Gavin’s many screeches of terror. 

“Michael, protect me!” Gavin yelled as his character ran behind the other, frantically trying to reload his empty gun, and the flashing numbers in the corner telling him he was shit out of luck, as he didn’t have anything left. “Michael!” He screamed as he watched his character sink to the floor after a violent shot that came from the others gun. 

“We’re on different teams, you idiot!” Michael broke into laughter, even as his own character was shot from across the map. He didn’t seem to mind it as much as Gavin thought he would, though he did swear under his breath. 

They only played a couple more rounds after that, before Gavin got bored. It was getting late anyway, and he still had to write down the information he had learned tonight. As he bid Michael goodnight, the others phone went off with a chirp. He glanced down at the phone and looked confused. “I gotta take this. Don’t be a stranger, okay?” Michael said in farewell, and let himself out. Gavin heard the beginning of the phone call, and leaned against the door to hear as much as he was able. 

“What the fuck? Why are you calling me this late?” Michael hissed into the phone, and there was muffled talking from the other side of the phone, which was thankfully loud. This was probably due to Michael’s perchance of being around a large amount of explosions, his hearing was a little worse for wear. 

“What the hell are you talking about, Jeremy? They haven’t been able to figure it out for years, what makes you think that suddenly they’re digging stuff up from years ago.” Another bout of muffled speaking, and Michael heaved a loud, heavy sigh. “Fine. I’m coming down now, meet me by the door in a couple minutes, I can’t drive right now.” 

A confused sound was heard, and Michael sounded like he was about to yell down the phone, but was just holding himself back enough to avoid suspicion. As if Gavin wasn’t huddled up against his door, listening intently. He would have been recording the conversation if he hadn’t left his cellphone in his room. “I told him that I was going to be busy tonight, I didn’t think I had to stay sober, fuck. Just get over here.” With that, Michael hung up.

Two seconds later, there was a knock on Gavin’s door, and he was so startled that he almost fell to the ground, only catching himself by the handle of his coat closet. His mind ran through all the reasons why Michael could possibly be trying to get back into his apartment, until his eyes rested on the navy jacket sitting on his couch. 

Oh. That.

After waiting a normal amount of time, Gavin opened the door, trying to look like he hadn’t just had a heart attack on the other side of the inch thick wood plank that was separating them. “I forgot my coat.” Michael explained before Gavin could even ask, inviting himself in. “Sorry about that, work calls, right?” Michael scoffed, slinging the jacket onto his shoulders. 

“At three am?” Gavin questioned, and almost slapped himself. That doesn’t sound suspicious at all. 

“Yeah, some other construction company is trying to get a permit for the same building we’re working on, and my boss just found out now. I don’t know why the fuck he needs me there, but whatever floats his boat.” Gavin nodded, still holding the door open. “Like I said earlier, don’t be a stranger. This was fun. I’m definitely taking you up on that bar crawl.”

Gavin smiled openly, and Michael walked out, not going to his own apartment, but down the hall to the elevator. Gavin closed the door, and rushed to his computer, pulling up the camera outside of their building. There was already a person waiting there on a motorcyle, cracking their knuckles and looking towards the door of the building. He watched as Michael exited the building, flipped the guy the bird, and got on the bike. Neither bothered with helmets as they pulled away from the sidewalk.

Gavin tried to follow them through the city using the cameras, but his brain was too foggy to remember which number corresponded to the city street, and eventually gave up. He went back and took a couple screenshots of the two on the bike, and dug through his computer until he found his evidence folder. Opening a new document, he began to type all of the new information he had learned about Michael into the profile he had created. 

It had been a productive night, but that phone call was worrying. Gavin would usually look into more, perhaps tracking down the plate number of the bike, but the call of sleep was unusually hypnotic, and he resigned himself to locking his computer again, and heading to bed. He would finish everything in the morning. 

At least, that was his plan.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so for this story, i'm not including ray as a main character, and jeremy is already a part of the crew (maybe not a full fledged member but he is There). i know this doesn't follow the actual course of events when they joined and blah blah blah canon blah but i really don't care this is already an au. anyway, see you next thursday!


	4. Chapter 4

Morning was slow and groggy, Gavin huddled underneath his blankets to hide from the sunlight. A mild hangover was hammering behind his eyes, but it was quiet enough to ignore. He was content to lay in bed all day, no real job calling his attention anytime soon, though a part of him knew he would have to do a small job for some low rank crew sometime in the next month, to keep himself sustained. 

The only reason he dragged himself out of bed was because of a knock at the door. He dragged himself out, and wrapped a blanket around himself. On his way down the hall, he glanced into the bathroom and saw his hair was sticking up in a thousand different directions, and resigned himself to his fate when another knock came, increasingly more impatient. 

“I’m coming!” He rose his voice to what he assumed was a reasonable level for an apartment building, and continued down the hall. It only took him a few more seconds to get to the door, and when he opened it, he didn’t recognize the person in front of him. Likely due to the mask covering his face.

What a prick. 

“Who the hell are you?” Gavin asked bluntly, sleep still hanging over him. He stared at the mask, trying to see through it somehow, to find the face beneath it. 

“I could ask you the same. Our sources name you as-” The man seemed to hold back a laugh. “‘Golden Boy’, but I’ve been told otherwise.” Gavin was instantly much more awake, and his flight instinct kicked in. He recognized the mask suddenly. However, he managed to outwardly keep his cool. 

He knew this day would come someday. 

“So, are you here to kill me, or what?” He demanded, inwardly cringing at his appearance. He didn’t plan on dying swathed in a blanket with bedhead, but if that’s the way he was going to go, at least it was being recognized for his work. 

“Actually, I’m not here to kill you at all. If you’ll come with me, I’ll explain.” Gavin knew he didn’t actually have a choice in this matter, but he was going to push it anyway.

“Can’t you just tell me what’s going on here? I’d love to get back to bed, if you aren’t going to kill me now.” His eyes finally broke contact with the mask, and went to the jacket instead. He squinted at it, confused. It looked just a little like Michael’s. 

Impossible. 

“Did that sound like a choice?” The man questioned, this time Gavin listening very carefully to the voice. However faint this man’s accent was, it was still distinctly southern. 

“Fine, let me change into clothes first.” Before the man denied him this, he interrupted him. “People will be suspicious of a guy in a mask leading someone in a blanket down the street.” With that, he left the man at the door. 

Which probably wasn’t smart, since at second glance, Gavin had discovered five different weapons hiding in the man’s coat alone. But, he figured if this guy had found him in a night, if he really was from the crew, he would have killed him on sight rather than put up a front.

He changed quickly, grabbing a purple shirt off the floor and shoving sunglasses on his face to possibly stave off his oncoming headache. He shoved his hair down in the mirror, and deemed himself presentable. “Should I bring my laptop on this trip, Mr. Creepy Guy Sitting On My Couch?” He heard a huff from down the hall, followed by a resolute affirmative. 

He shoved his laptop into his bag, thankful he hadn’t done anything about the crew on it. All of his research was saved on his desktop, under hundreds of layers of encryption that only he could unlock. 

Many had tried, and all had failed. 

He exited the room, and found the masked man standing in his living room, and he felt the air of awkwardness around the man. As if he didn’t know what to do with himself if it wasn’t threatening someone. 

“Not used to being someone’s retriever?” Gavin quipped, hoping against hope that he wasn’t killed for that remark, but the masked man just sent him a glare. So he had strict orders to be kept alive, at least for now. 

They exited the building and Gavin was lead to a car, not the Roosevelt from before, which lead him to believe that the car was kept for heists alone. Which made sense, since it was pretty recognizable. 

“So, is there something I should call you?” Gavin asked, leaning up from the back seat where he had been forced into. “I have a feeling you know my real name, but I’m not going to get yours, but instead a ridiculous code name… Like Skullboy.” The man shifted with annoyance, and Gavin corrected himself. “Skullman?” He pressed. 

“The Vagabond.” The man grunted, and Gavin was pleased for a moment, but he soon had more questions. 

“Wait, but doesn’t that mean-”

“Do you ever shut up?” The Vagabond interrupted him, and Gavin sat back on the seat. He thought for a moment how to approach this, before realizing something was out of place. 

“Don’t you normally blindfold people when bringing them to your super secret base?” He leaned forward again, pointedly staring out the front window. He already had no clue where he was, but the Vagabond didn’t need to know that. 

“You’re not going to our base, and this safe house will be destroyed in twenty four hours.” The answer made sense, but Gavin was a little disappointed. “We also know that you’ve only been in Los Santos about two weeks, and don’t know anything about the city.” He had to admit, they did their basic research. 

If he hadn’t been focused on finding out the secret identity of a certain neighbor, he probably could have told the guy next to him half of his own life story. 

The hour was about two hours out of the city, and he didn’t shut up once for the entire drive, just to piss off dark, tall, and cranky in the front seat. 

He didn’t like the idea of death, but he had a feeling that the Vagabond was on a short leash at the moment, for some reason. 

When they finally pulled into the driveway of a small house with noone around for at least a half hour, and fear finally hit Gavin. He still didn’t know what the Vagabond could possible want with him. Everytime he tried to mention it, he was met with silence. 

He was hustled into the house, all calm from the city gone, and he was met with a man with a curly mustache, a woman with a hawaiian shirt, and silence. He did a quick survey of the living room he was standing in, holding tightly onto the straps of his backpack. On a quick look over, he found twenty six weapons in arms reach of the pair standing on the other side of the living room, sizing him up. 

“Huh. He’s not really that…” The woman spoke up first, obviously searching him for the weapon that he didn’t have. 

“Golden?” The mustached man offered, and the woman nodded in agreement. Gavin let himself pout, running a self conscious hand through his hair. He hated the nickname, but it was his reputation. Most people who knew the name assumed that it was given to him for extravagant spending, but it was quite the opposite. 

Sure, he would splurge sometimes, but the name had nothing to do with what he owned, nor his finances. In fact, the nickname was more of an insult than anything. Back in England, when he began to make a reputation for himself, when he was still a rookie, someone had found some information about him that he never wanted to get out, in fear of it making him seem weaker. 

Gavin had never been on the front lines of a heist, in fact, most times he was hidden in a van, a basement, hidden away from any potential violence. Given that, he had never killed a person, which for the people he kept company with, was something to be ashamed of. 

He was a hacker, not a murderer. 

When he offered no explanation, the mustached man clasped his hands together, and gestured to the couch beside Gavin. “Please, take a seat.” He offered, sounding too kind for Gavin to be comfortable. 

“I’d rather stand until I know what I’m doing here.” The woman shot the man a look, and he nodded. 

“Alright, suit yourself.” Mustache said, and sat himself down on the armchair. The woman took a seat as well, and the Vagabond walked from the front door to the wall opposite Gavin. 

“Why am I here.” He repeated himself one final time, making it more of a statement than a question at this point. 

“We’ve heard of your reputation, and we’re impressed.” Mustache explained, and Gavin nodded, prompting him to continue. “We also have a little trouble that we’d like you to help with.” He adjusted his hold on his backpack, ignoring his headache that was growing worse with every second. 

“Why should I help you? I don’t even know you people.” Gavin asked, pushing his own luck. 

“Well, we’ll pay you, for one.” That would probably be enough for Gavin, but the man continued. “You’ll be protected by the biggest crew in LS, unless you decide to go against us, in which you’ll be dealt with accordingly. In this city, that’s worth more than any amount of money we could pay you.” 

The woman nodded, the Vagabond staying silent in the back of the room. Gavin pretended to consider it for much longer than he actually did, speaking up after half a minute. “What do you need me to do? I have.” He swallowed past the nerves in his throat. “I have my limits.” 

“It’s within those limits, you’ll be here on your laptop for the next twenty hours, given a packet of information, and whatever you have at the end of that time, we’ll pay you for.” The woman explained, picking up a brown manilla folder from the table. 

Gavin counted to twenty in his head, and slowly nodded, reaching for the folder. Mustache smiled and stood. “We’ll be back in a few hours with food, if you need anything else just let him know.” He jerked his head to the Vagabond, and Gavin frowned. 

“You guys aren’t sticking around?” Mustache laughed as the woman just shook her head, still walking to the door. 

“We’ve got much more important things to do.” And with that, the pair were gone, and silence took over. Gavin looked up at the Vagabond, who was still staring forward at him, seeming unbothered. 

He decided it would be best to get to work, rather than bother the man. 

Gavin pulled the folder towards him, and opened the folder. Within seconds, he knew exactly what he was reading. 

This was his work, from the past two weeks. Hours of empty security records, browser history, and google searches stared him in the face, mocking him from the page.

Shit.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> BOY OH BOY WE GETTING DEM PLOT POINTS!!! I love writing this story so much you don't understand I have 11 chapters ready to go RIGHT NOW get HYPED


	5. Chapter 5

Five hours deep into research, he had built up a strong case for another small time hacker he had located within the Los Santos area, building up the browser history dating back a few weeks, and remotely planting evidence on the hard drive. It took a lot longer than it would have if he had his desktop, with his laptop heaving from the strain every few minutes. The Vagabond still hadn’t moved, and Gavin honestly couldn’t tell if he was even awake at this point. He didn’t bother to check, going back to his work.

He was curious how they had even found out about him, he hadn’t been able to find any information about a resident hacker, or even security for the crew, but he hadn’t been doing too much research on that aspect of things.

The Vagabond shifted in the corner, after hours of no movement, and Gavin leaped at the opportunity. He didn’t know if he would get an answer, but thus far, the Vagabond seemed to answer him as long as his question didn’t jeopardize the crew.

“So, how did you find out where I lived?” Gavin spoke up, breaking the silence that had been suffocating him for the past few hours. The Vagabond didn’t answer that, and Gavin pouted. “C’mon, you can’t just leave me hanging here. I’ve left my apartment a total of two times, that’s so much footage to look through to find my exact location, and I know my computer can’t be tracked.

“We had our ways.” Was his only answer, and Gavin heard the threat on the man’s tongue, so he shut his mouth. They found him once, the Vagabond could do it again once his leash was loosened.

“Is there anything specific I should be looking for here? All I have is what the guy had been searching for, and a potential flaw in the cities surveillance system.” Gavin asked again, figured that as long as it concerned his work, he would get a straight answer.

“We need a name, a location, and what he was looking to find.” The Vagabond replied shortly, and silence descended again. Gavin nodded, and dug himself into the inner workings of the other hackers hard drive.

The fact that he’d even been able to remotely connect to it was astonishing to Gavin, and told him that this was definitely someone who didn’t know what they were doing, and instead watched a few episodes of Mr. Robot and decided it looked cool. He also had a mild hunch that this person had done a little independent research on the crew, as he found searches from a few months ago, much further than he had planted them.

This was good for Gavin, as he was able to figure out the plan pretty quickly, and felt his own anger rising.

This person had recently been in contact with a rival crew, who Gavin had never heard of before, offering information on the Fake AH Crew. The price that was set on the information was ridiculously low, screaming amateur with every word. He took screenshots of the emails to print out later, and dug deeper.

He started passing multiple emails from any number of people, all subject lines pointing to the fact that this person owned the other money. The amount of emails was concerning, and Gavin stopped only about halfway down, unable to see it anymore.

This person was struggling, that much was true, and Gavin suddenly felt guilt settle heavy in his stomach.

While yes, this person was putting the crew at danger by selling information about them, whatever they had found likely wouldn’t have bothered them at all, since this person was a newbie. This person was more desperate than anything.

“Bugger it all.” He mumbled quietly to himself, now battling his guilt and his self preservation. He didn’t know what the crew planned on doing to this person once they found out who it was, but he had the feeling that it wouldn’t be good.

At this exact moment, the front door opened and the woman returned, alone. “You’re free for a couple hours, don’t go too far.” She said to the Vagabond, who nodded wordlessly and left. Gavin heard a bike rumble to life outside a couple moments later, and let out a breath he didn’t know he had been holding.

“How’s it going?” The woman asked, sitting herself down on the couch across from him. He wasn’t sure what to say, so he just pulled up the screenshots of the earlier emails. Gavin turned the laptop towards her, and watched her face as she read through the emails.

“Son of a bitch.” She was obviously impressed, and Gavin turned the laptop back towards him, closing the screenshots, and revealing the debt emails once more.

He had to say something.

“There’s one other thing. It doesn’t necessarily affect what’s going on here, but.” He turned the laptop around once more. Again, the woman’s face softened as she read.

“Ah. Well.” She let out a sigh, leaning back on the couch. “That will be Geoffrey’s call then.” She said, more to herself than Gavin, but he still clung to the small information that he got from the statement. Geoffrey was either the leader, or the Vagabond. He tucked the information away for later, and turned his laptop back to himself.

“So far, I’ve figured out that this person is new, and doesn’t know how to cover his own tracks. I can get pretty much anything you guys need on him in a few hours. The Vagabond told me you needed a name, location and motivation?” He asked, and she nodded.

“Yeah, that’s basically it.” She paused for a moment, as if suddenly remembering something. “I’ll be right back.” She said, and quickly got up, exiting the house. Gavin was left alone for the first time since he had opened the door to his apartment, and it was eerie. He wasn’t anywhere he recognized, and there was nothing around him through the windows to tell him where he was. Before he could really take advantage of the solitude, the woman was back, holding two paper bags with bright logo’s printed all over them.

“Here, you should take a break and eat. I didn’t know what you liked, so I just got you a burger and some condiment packets.” Gavin nodded his thanks, and took a bag from her as she held it out. She sat down once again, and pulled out her own meal.

They ate in silence for a bit, before she spoke up again. “How long have you been hacking?” She asked, and Gavin paused in his bite, before slowing beginning to chew again. He had to think about the answer, and whether or not this woman was trustworthy. “If you answer, I’ll answer a question you have.” She said again, shoving a bit of red hair out of her face. He nodded, and swallowed the food in his mouth.

“Since I was around fifteen. It was never anything huge then, just looking at stuff and seeing what I could. There wasn’t a whole wack of things to do where I grew up, so I just got curious and sort of made a game of how quick I could break through someone’s protections.” As he was telling the story, Gavin thought back to the last time he had told this story, the last time he had seen one of his closest friends. Before the silence could catch them again, he asked his question. “What’s your name?”

Basics first was the best course of action, to establish some trust with these people.

“Jack. When did you start getting into bigger jobs?” And so it went, each asking the other questions that had bigger implications simply based on their respective professions, but never outright asking the important questions.

“When did your crew start?” _How skilled are you at whatever you do?_

“Why did you never join a crew?” _Why has a crew never asked you to join?_

“How many of there are you?” _How many people in this city could kill me?_

“Why did you come to America?” _What are you running from?_


	6. Chapter 6

Another hour later, Gavin had all the information they were looking for neatly sorted into a folder on his desktop, ready to be printed out as Jack had instructed. They ran out of ways to dance around the real questions they had a few minutes before the man with the curly mustache returned. Following him was the Vagabond, who seemed to be texting on his phone. Gavin didn’t have to wonder for long which one was named Geoffrey, as Jack stood up and beckoned him over to the laptop.

“Geoff, come look at what the kids got. It doesn’t seem as bad as we thought.” Gavin frowned at being called a kid for a few seconds, but didn’t speak up. They could call him whatever they wanted, as long as he survived all this. Geoff slid the laptop towards him, sitting on the couch right next to Gavin, and began looking through the photos. A few minutes later, he nodded, seemingly satisfied. 

“You did good. We’ll take this from here, you can put the stuff on this-” He handed Gavin a flash drive that had a green symbol painted on the side. “And then the Vagabond will drive you home.” He said the name with a slight teasing tone, sending a glance to the still silent figure across the room. “Don’t worry, he won’t kill you. You’ve done excellent work on this, and we may contact you again.” Geoff watched as Gavin transferred the files over, and handed back the flash drive. With that, he nodded and left, Jack at his heels. 

Again, he was left alone with the Vagabond, who finally tucked his phone into his pocket. “Are you ready to go?” He asked, and Gavin nodded quickly, closing his laptop and shoving it into his bag. He was eager to get home, but he still wanted to learn about the crew, so the chance to ask the Vagabond more questions without the threat of his life hanging over his head was enticing. 

The ride home seemed a lot shorter than it was going out there, but that may have been due to the Vagabond completely ignoring any speed limits whatsoever. He only slowed down once they were in city limits, and even then he was still going at least thirty over. When Gavin was dropped off on the road outside of his house, he felt empty, watching the car drive off without another word from the Vagabond. 

That may have been the last time he saw anyone from the crew, and there was an inkling of sadness in him. He thought that he would have been more useful, that they wanted to keep him around, but now he was left on the sidewalk, alone.

As he was walking down the hall to his apartment, the door next to his opened, and Michael walked out, looking at his phone. He tapped the screen once then locked it, shoving it in his pocket and walking straight down the hall to the elevator. He nodded once at Gavin as he went by, but seemed focused on something else, and Gavin tried to ignore the thought that immediately popped into his head. 

Once he got into his apartment, he logged onto his computer and found the files he had on the Fake AH Crew, and immediately began transferring them to a portable hard drive. This whole experience reminded him that there were other hackers out there who might try to get into his computer, to see what he’d been doing, and sell him out. He couldn’t afford that happening now, if he really didn’t make an impact on the crew, he was still in danger. Even if he was sure he was protected by his firewalls, there was still a chance. 

Once he transferred the files completely, he wiped the computer, saving anything actually important on a different hard drive. Gavin left the computer to do as it would, and went back to the living room where he had left his bag. He couldn’t get his mind off the work, however, and pulled his laptop out, looking up the person who he had found to blame. 

He came across a twitter account, and scrolled for a while, guilt seeping into his bones. This person seemed like they were going through a genuinely hard time, with a go-fund-me in their pinned tweet. He clicked through, and read their story, trying to ignore any emotion. 

Eventually, he couldn’t handle the weight of what he’d done, and slammed his laptop shut, instead giving himself some time to relax. He had spent the majority of the day in panic mode, potentially getting another hacker killed, or whatever they were going to do to them. He tried to get his mind off of it by playing video games for a couple hours, but then he started thinking about Michael, and that road would only lead back to where he was earlier. 

The game bored him eventually, an old one that he’d perfected at least twice, and grabbed his wallet from where it was on the table. On his way out, he considered stopped by Michael’s, and see if he wanted to do a bar crawl, but just as he was thinking that, the elevator dinged and the other man appeared down the hall. “Hi Michael!” Gavin said once he was close enough, and Michael nodded at him again. 

“What’s up, Gavin?” He asked, stopping outside his door. Gavin tried to gage his mood, and he didn’t think Michael was too cranky, but something was definitely bothering him. 

“I was going to go on a bar crawl, but I don’t really know any bars, so I was just going to ask if you wanted to go get some bevs.” He explained, letting a little hope into his voice. 

“That sounds fucking amazing right now, dude.” Michael replied, and started to lead the way back down the hall. He seemed determined to get to a bar as soon as possible, and led Gavin to the closest bar he could find. 

As they settled on bar stools, Michael ordered three shots, and downed all three in quick succession before Gavin had even sipped his beer. “Whoa boy, what’s the rush?” Gavin questioned, hoping that he would get a little more out of him. Michael just looked at him for a moment, and Gavin suddenly felt like he was being sussed out. 

“Rough day at work.” Was the only answer he got before Michael ordered a final shot and a beer. “Need to get my mind off shit.” He finished the shot with that, and took the beer, finally slowing down. Gavin just watched as Michael took his first sip of beer, and seemed to calm down for a bit. The night went like that, Gavin quietly sipping his beer while Michael downed various forms of alcohol much faster than Gavin would ever dare to. He knew he was a lightweight, he could admit that to himself. 

After Michael had about four drinks at a bar, he would insist they move to the next one, with each bar becoming more intoxicated. And loud. Gavin had to apologize to a woman after Michael shouted at her for taking too long to order a drink, and lead Michael away to a table, where he couldn’t bother anyone else. 

“Okay, something’s seriously wrong. I’ve only known you for like two weeks, and I can tell.” Gavin prompted, ignoring his own cold beer. The last few bars, he’d only been able to have one drink at each before Michael was pulling him out the door. 

“Gavin, Gav. I can’t fucking tell you shit.” Michael slurred, shaking his head. “My boss would fucking murder me.” He took another swig of the drink in his hand, then leaned in across the table separating them. “If I tell you, I’d have to kill you.” He whispered, and Gavin felt a chill run down his spine. This pretty much confirmed his theory, but he didn’t dare let that be revealed on his face. However, as soon as he said that, Michael burst out into laughter, leaning back against the booth. 

Gavin had so many mixed signals going through his head, it was about to overheat. He had no clue if Michael was joking, or serious, but he did have some sense of self preservation, so he didn’t want to test it. 

He would still be surprised if he made it out of tonight uninjured. 

When they finally stumbled home hours later, Michael was thoroughly wasted, laughing loudly as they talked back and forth. Gavin was glad he had had eased back on his drinking when he realized that Michael was going to get trashed. As they approached their apartment, Michael turned to Gavin with sudden seriousness. “Come with me to the roof.” He said, careful that his words were clear and precise. Gavin just nodded, confused. 

Michael led him to the roof, now gone quiet. The journey to the roof was short, and Michael took him right to the edge, staring out across the city. Their apartment wasn’t particularly tall, but they were still able to see the majority of the city. They sat and just let silence mingle for them, Michael climbing up onto the separating wall and letting his feet dangle. 

“Why did you choose Los Santos?” Michael finally spoke up, and Gavin frowned from where he was leaning against the wall, elbows propping himself up. 

“I grew up in a smaller town, and wanted to experience… y’know. The American dream and all that.” Gavin lied through his teeth, looking towards the hills where he could see lights from cars going up and down the street. 

“Bullshit.” Michael huffed, and Gavin froze, before he continued. “The American dream is dead. This city kills it.” Gavin didn’t speak up, instead choosing to listen. He didn’t care what this had to do about the crew, that wasn’t in his mind at all right now. This seemed important to Michael, more than anything else. 

“I didn’t come here to be demolitions. I wanted something else. I never found it though. Everyone who lives here wants something more than they can achieve, and no one’s going to get there.” Michael sighed deeply, closing his eyes against the light of the city. Gavin stayed quiet for a couple more seconds, before he finally spoke up. 

“What did you want to be?” He asked quietly, the gentle wind almost muting his words. 

“Not this. I don’t know what I wanted, but I know I wanted to be something happier than this.” Michael seemed to be stopping himself from saying something, but Gavin wouldn’t push. They settled again, and Michael finally turned back from the city, climbing off the wall back onto the safety of the porch. “I need another beer.” He said, and led Gavin back inside to their two apartments. Stopping in front of his door, he turned to Gavin.

“Wait here?” He asked, and Gavin nodded. Michael disappeared for a moment, he heard a fridge open, then close again, the clank of bottles hitting each other gently, before the door was opened again, Michael squeezing out in a way that Gavin wouldn’t have been able to see in. 

He wasn’t even trying. 

Gavin invited Michael into his apartment, where they played Halo for another few hours. He wasn’t used to this, he wasn’t used to people he became close to for reasons other than work. But he didn’t care about the work anymore, he didn’t care what Michael was apart of. This was someone he wanted to be friends with, something he hadn’t wanted in years. 

When Michael finally went home that night, after a few more beers and a lot of games, Gavin just sat in his apartment, staring at his tv screen and just listening to the silence. 

He didn’t know what to do, he knew this wasn’t safe, to become friends with someone like this, but his life wasn’t safe, he wasn’t going to fool himself like that, but this is much closer than he’d been to other people before. Other criminals. 

But maybe this could work. Maybe, he could fully put himself into this, to find a place in this city, to become one of the people who ran the city and maybe the crew was the best group of people to do it with. 

And maybe, he was a little drunk. 

He went to bed, just so he could think on this in the morning, with a fresh mind. When Gavin did wake up in the morning, he had a plan. He knew that research could only get him so far, especially with a crew like this. So, he knew the only real way to find out the truth was to find his way into work with them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> OOOO EXPOSITION


	7. Chapter 7

His plan wasn’t as easy to accomplish as it seemed. 

Gavin wasn’t used to friendship.

His plan to get his name out there involved a lot of research, and that would take him a very long time, time that normal people wouldn’t work, and Gavin didn’t want any suspicions arising around what he actually did. So, he set an alarm for around five, when he would take a break, and make himself food. After that, he would talk to Michael some more, and hopefully would be good for the next couple days, when he could throw himself into the work, trying to find a way into communication with someone to give him a job in this city

This was much more stressful than his normal work would be. 

But, it had to work, he had too much depending on this not to. He spent the following hours until his phone went off neck deep in information that he had no clue actually meant anything, and nearly knocked over a bottle of water when his alarm did finally go off, shocking him out of his concentration. He swore, wiping up the small droplets that had dribbled out of the bottle onto his desk, and turned off the alarm. Gavin took a couple minutes to come back to reality, stretching and groaning when various joints popped, then went to the kitchen to make himself some food. 

While he was eating, he logged onto his Xbox, as Michael had added him the previous night at some point. It alerted him that his neighbor was online, so he sent him an invite to some game that he could easily play while eating. 

They played for about a half hour before Gavin was finished eating and put on his headset, opening the voice chat with Michael, who was already yelling over something going on in the game. They chatted for a bit, playing various game types and eventually, after a few hours, Michael bid Gavin goodnight, and logged off. 

Gavin got back to work, diving head first back into the research, following a lead he had stumbled across before his alarm went off. It had been bugging him all night, but he think he had the solution that he was looking for. 

This went on for a few days, Gavin working well into the night, and passing out at his desk, then finding a way to convince Michael that he was doing regular work, whether it be going out drinking, or just logging onto Xbox live for a couple hours and relaxing, but his mind was on the chase the whole time. By the end of the week, Gavin was exhausted, but close to finishing the final steps of getting in contact with someone trustworthy. 

He was delirious at this point, running straight into the opposite team during fighting games, or running off into the distance in free world experiences. Michael would get visibly more frustrated with him each time they failed whatever objective they were working on, and eventually, Gavin heard the other rip his microphone off, and the slam of a door in the hall. 

Seconds later, his doorknob began rattling, and Gavin jumped to his feet, shoving his various folders full of research into hiding places, crumbling pages up and trying to make his apartment look livable, and not like he hadn’t been just barely surviving for the last week. 

“Gavin, fucking open up!” Michael yelled, completely uncaring of everyone else in his building, continuing to pull on the door handle. Gavin took one last look around, and deemed it okay, and opened the door. Michael burst through, fists clenched. “You fucking idiot! You just got both of us fucking killed for the FIFTEENTH FUCKING TIME!” He yelled, advancing on Gavin, backing him away from the door back into his living room, where the death screen was still active on the tv. “We’ve been trying to do this for a fucking hour!” 

“Michael, I’m trying-”

“Trying to fucking kill me? Fuck!” Michael continued yelling, gesturing wildly towards the tv. “We’re on the same fucking team!” 

“Michael!” Gavin squeaked, more out of fear than anything else as Michael moved to grab him. He wasn’t sure what was going to happen, but he wasn’t about to let himself get caught, ducking underneath his arm and running towards the kitchen. 

“Get the fuck back here!” Michael yelled, giving chase. They continued like this for a couple minutes, Michael eventually laughing more than he yelled. Gavin was able to just avoid Michael and lead him out of the apartment, running full speed down the hallway, almost falling at least three times and slamming his palm onto the ‘call elevator’ button. He continued hitting it until Michael drew too close for comfort, and then turned towards the stairway door. Just as he opened the door to run down, he heard the elevator ding and let out a squawk of disbelief, but continued down the stairs. 

He only got down a floor before he tripped, yelling as he grabbed the railing as he started to fall. “Gavin!” Michael yelled, more concerned than angry at this point. He let out another laugh as Gavin came to a stop halfway down the stairs, his hand grasping the railing with white knuckles. 

“Michael, please. Michael!” Gavin let out, gritting his teeth. He heard the other walk down the stairs, and then there was a hand on his arm, pulling him to his feet. He stumbled a bit getting his footing, and almost pulled Michael down when his foot missed the step and forcefully hit the lower step as his free arm flailed about. 

“Holy shit dude.” Michael was out of breath by this point, after chasing Gavin around his apartment and down the stairs. They both broke out into laughter, and made their way back up the stairs, eventually coming to a stop outside their doors. Gavin sunk down against the wall, taking a few deep breaths. 

“You need to fucking. Stop.” Michael said, much more calm than he was before, but still out of breath. They both sat down in the hallway, breathing slowly. Every so often, they would break out into giggles again, until one of their other neighbors, some middle aged woman with shoulder length hair ducked out of her apartment, looking more exhausted than Gavin felt, the sound of a screaming baby following her. 

“Can you two shut the fuck up! You woke up my kid!” She scowled, and Gavin shied away while Michael met her glare head on. 

“It’s like 7:30, shut the fuck up.” He said, but still got up, gesturing for Gavin to follow him. They exited the apartment, the woman grumbling as they passed her apartment, and Gavin could have sworn she hissed or something. “Fucking bitch.” Michael huffed when the elevator door closed, and hit the button for the garage. 

“Where are we going?” Gavin asked, happy to just follow, rubbing his tired eyes against the stark lights. He hadn’t been in the garage before, he had no reason to. Looking around, it seemed that there wouldn’t be space for him anyway.

“Well, I have some fireworks, and it’s a clear night, so I figure we stop at the beer store, then drive up to Chiliad and shoot some rockets.” Michael replied, gesturing towards a sleek black car. 

An hour later found them sitting in the dirt, Michael setting up a frankly dangerous amount of fireworks a little way away from where Gavin was sitting, sipping a beer. The fireworks were loud and bright, scaring away any form of exhaustion in Gavin, as he stared up at the stars. 

He hadn’t seen the night sky properly since he moved to Los Santos. 

They settled back with their drinks once Michael had exhausted his supply of fireworks, and Gavin had convinced him not to create a new batch from the leftovers. 

“Back home, I used to climb onto my roof in the middle of the night and just stare at the stars for hours.” Gavin commented after a few moments of quiet, the echo’s of the fireworks ringing in his ears still. “My friend Dan found me up there one day, passed out. He had to get my dad to get the ladder out so he could get me down.” Gavin cracked a smile at the memory, shaking his head. 

“Where’s Dan now?” Michael asked, sounding like he was smiling too.

“What?” 

“I mean like, why didn’t he come to Los Santos too?” 

“We did plan on moving here together, after college… He’s in the army now. I haven’t heard from him in a few months.” They fell silent again, both knowing the implications. “I got tired of waiting, and I just came here on my own. When-” Gavin cut himself off, not fooling himself. “If he gets back, we’ll find each other.” 

They fell silent again, and Gavin could feel Michael trying to think of a story he could talk about to make Gavin feel a little less alone in his experience. “I haven’t talked to my brother in five years.” Was all he said, and Gavin didn’t know how to reply. 

As much as Dan had been one of his closest friends, and almost like a brother to him, it wasn’t the same as this. 

So they turned into silence, their only constant companion, thinking about the friendships and family they both had lost due to distance, and time. 

This night had taken a turn that Gavin hadn’t expected, but maybe it was good. Friendship wasn’t just playing games and drinking.

After an hour of laying on the ground, staring at the skies and just talking about random shit, Gavin started to shiver, exhaustion returning. The drive home was quiet, listening to the radio until a song they both knew came on, and they both started belting the lyrics, eventually dissolving into laughter at the end of the last chorus, Michael taking the long way home. 

It was a good night.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wanted to give my boys a break from The Struggle™, so enjoy some Struggle Lite.


	8. Chapter 8

Two days later, Gavin had all the information he needed, and begun his work. The group he had found was a relatively small group, who were just looking for a simple hack, something to make their finances look better. He took a couple hours to himself after the job, and then threw himself into another. 

Gavin spent a week doing pretty much every job that came in his direction, never leaving his apartment. His reputation had apparently transferred overseas, as ever so often he was addressed by the nickname he loathed so much, but never corrected. 

It was another half a week until his phone rang for the first time since he started this endeavor. 

He didn’t recognize the person’s voice on the other end of the phone, but they told them he had some information they were looking for. When he expressed confusion, the phone was hung up, and there was a hard knock at his front door. 

Gavin opened the door to someone he didn’t recognize, likely due to the mask. “Let’s go.” Was the only thing that was said, and he was led out of his own apartment. He wanted to protest, but it didn’t seem like the best idea when this person had at least five knives at his waist, and seemed to know how to use them. 

They pulled up to what seemed like an office building, and he clenched his fists, feeling a little out of his depth here. Before he was allowed in the building, he was patted down for weapons, and every fiber of his being had to concentrate on not flinching away from this stranger who was suddenly grabbing his clothing for seconds at a time. The masked person just stood to the side, clearly riddled with hidden weapons, but remained unbothered. 

He was led to an elevator, which is only then that he realized they weren’t even on the bottom floor, as the person punched the first button, standing to the side. This was the first time Gavin felt obliged to speak up. “Where am I going?” 

“Shut up.” Was the only answer he received, and again he had to force himself not to flinch. He stared at the eye of the mask, then to the floor when the man suddenly turned to him. Gavin didn’t have a second to relax before the man had grabbed him, and started to tie a blindfold around his eyes. “Don’t struggle.” He was instructed gruffly, and the only noise he let out was a panicked yelp. 

The elevator opened, and he was grabbed by the arm, and led into a flurry of activity. He suddenly understood the blindfold, as there was no way everyone in this building was wearing a mask or a disguise. He was lead through a twisting floor, and then there was the sound of a door slamming shut behind him, and the blindfold was taken off. 

The room around him was dark, with a single lamp on a desk with a laptop already running in front of him. The masked figure stood by the door, wordless. Gavin didn’t say a word, looking at the computer ahead of him. After a second of hesitation, the person shoved him towards the computer, and Gavin caught himself on the chair, taking a seat. 

In front of him was a note file with what he assumed was what he was supposed to be doing here, but there was a part of him that had a bad feeling about all of this. Yes, he had spent the past week working tirelessly on this, on trying to find a job for a crew that could get him in contact with the Fake crew, and these people seemed like they knew what they were doing but he still could be wrong. Maybe this was a test, and there was something he was supposed to catch in the terabits of data he had to dig through, something that would change the entire point of all of this. 

“Hurry up.” The masked person demanded, and Gavin jumped, quickly beginning the work in front of him. The words were very vague, which made the work a lot more difficult. Whenever he tried to ask the person behind him for clarification, he was told to shut up, or to hurry up. By the time he was finished it, he was pretty pissed, just because he was doing work for this person, and they were treating him like garbage. 

The second he leaned back, just to relax for a moment before checking his work, the person demanded to know the progress, and that’s when Gavin lost it. 

“Yeah, I’m done. Take me home.” He cut the person off, getting up from the chair. He hadn’t organized the files, or even checked to make sure he was correct, but he didn’t want to deal with this anymore. He could find another job, another opportunity. 

Thankfully, it seemed the masked person didn’t know anything about what he was doing, and didn’t even check his work, just nodding and walking forward to manhandle the blindfold back onto his face. 

It was a half hour before Gavin was back home, and he felt unclean. He didn’t know what it was, but the heavy feeling in his guilt told him that something was wrong. There was an inner argument for a moment of him trying to get away for a bit, but eventually, the need for a shower won over, and he walked to his washroom. 

A couple hours later, he heard something slam in the hallway, and then someone running down the hall past his door, mumbling in a panicked voice. The pit in his stomach sunk deeper. That probably wasn’t a good sign. 

When he went to bed that night, he dreamed for the first time in a long time. Once he woke, he couldn’t remember the dream, but was left with a cold terror in his stomach. The next week, this feeling of dread followed him much longer than he thought it would. 

He hadn’t heard Michael come home in three days. 

The night Michael did return, he dragged Gavin out to a bar far across town, drinking until he could barely stand, yelling loudly at anyone who looked at him wrong, and only an hour after they got there, started a fight and got them kicked out. It was only 10. 

As they stumbled back home, Michael refused to say anything to Gavin. This was fine with him, as he had noticed a wound that had popped up on Michael’s arm, but didn't bring it up. He never mentioned the faint smell of fire that hung around him either, nothing. 

He knew when to hold his tongue, and just let Michael into his apartment. Once he got the very drunk man settled on his couch, he grabbed a couple bottles of water from the fridge, and forced him to drink it, ignoring the multiple complaints. 

That night was rough, as he was forced awake from the sound of yelling in his living room. He ran down the hall, peeking around the corner, only to find Michael, still asleep and grabbing the arm of his couch, almost panicked. 

Once he woke him up, they stayed up the rest of the night, playing video games in silence. Neither one wanted to talk about the dreams that had been haunting them. Sun rose, and Michael left without a word, taking the empty bottles with him. Gavin passed out on the couch, the long night of sleeplessness catching up to him. 

He didn’t see Michael for another week after that.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> the pain train is pulling into the station boys woot wooot
> 
> also little quick note i added Michael/Gavin to the relationships, i havent actually written them getting together but re-reading everything i have makes it seem very shippy so interpret it however you want, maybe i will, maybe i wont write them together


	9. Chapter 9

When Gavin next woke up, it was from his phone ringing. It was a blocked number, so he just let it ring to voicemail as he brought himself back to earth from the empty, dark sleep he had been trapped in. 

Whoever it was, they didn’t leave a voicemail, and Gavin ignored it for now. Maybe it was just a prank call, or a wrong number. He spent the day reading the news, only stopping when he came across a report about a gunfight that had ended in an explosion of a local factory. The police had disclosed that the explosion was caused from a bomb, and not natural forces, but couldn’t say if it was a terrorist attack, or something to do with the local gangs. 

Gavin knew. 

It was another week before he could go back to normality. He spent the week wandering around town, looking into shop windows, but ignoring anyone that wanted to talk to him. At one point, a car slowed down beside him, likely just to park, but it spooked him enough that he took off down the street, running until all the air in his lungs was gone, and he was left on the sidewalk, just trying to breath properly. 

No one was following, he was safe. 

A large amount of money had been deposited in his account, enough to keep his rent for the next month without doing another job, but he couldn’t stop. He needed to get what happened the previous week off his mind, so he went back to doing small jobs, things that didn’t need face to face interaction. 

That was, until a familiar woman in a Hawaiian shirt appeared at his door. Her face was a careful mask of calm, her smile tight, and controlled. There were few words exchanged, and soon Gavin was in her car, holding his laptop close as they drove through the downtown area. 

As they drove, she started to explain small bits of why they needed him again. It seemed she was holding back a lot of information. 

They got to a small apartment on the edge of town, and she brought them to the fifth floor. The apartment wasn’t particularly nice, in fact, it was a little run down. Gavin clutched his laptop closer until they were in the apartment itself, door shut and locked behind them. 

The Vagabond was sitting on a desktop in the corner, mask off. Gavin was only able to catch a glimpse of brown hair before the mask was back, a glare sent in Jack’s direction. “Some warning would have been nice.” He said, his voice deep and tired. 

“I did warn you, you ignored me.” She sent back quickly, and led Gavin over to the computer. He hung back for a bit, but when she looked back over her shoulder with a curious look, he stepped forward. On the screen, he could clearly see that the Vagabond had been trying to access someone’s hard drive remotely, but to no success. 

“We’ve been at this for almost a week, to no avail. We’ve all tried, but we’re running out of time at this point.” Jack admitted slowly, and the Vagabond glared at her again, but his gaze softened quickly. 

“I’ve almost got it, I just can’t-” 

“You need rest.” She cut him off, and that was all the other needed to stand, leaving the chair empty. He buzzed around the apartment for a bit, presumably collecting his things to leave, as Jack explained what was expected of him. 

When he was finally left to work, it took him far longer than he thought it would to finish what the Vagabond had started. As close as he had thought he was, it seemed like there was still quite a few layers of firewall to break through first. 

Gavin worked, ignoring the sun falling and rising outside the window. Jack came and went, putting coffee, food, and water in front of him. She was the only one that he saw, but he heard her talking on the phone in one of the bedrooms at one point. He was too busy to listen, but he did catch a couple names in the flow. At first, he tucked the information away for later. 

It took him about a minute to remember that he wasn’t researching these people anymore, that he was technically working for them now. He let the names go with a resigned sigh. The curiosity would kill him, but the crew would kill him faster. 

The work was long, and it took a toll on him as he started to doze off in front of the computer. That’s where Jack found him, a couple hours later, passed out on the keyboard in front of him. He didn’t know why he had fallen asleep, but his eyes still burned from staring at the monitor in front of him so intently. 

When he managed to wake up properly, and get back to work, against Jack’s protests, he had to bite his tongue when he realized that in his sleep, he had typed the letter ‘e’ at least 3,000 times. 

Real professional. 

About a day later, he finally broke through the firewalls, and was presented a very familiar hard drive. He was about to call out to Jack, tell her that he had cracked it, when something caught his eye.

His blood ran cold. 

His own information was on display in front of him, his work that he had done just last week. It was impossible, but there it was, right in front of him. 

It took everything in his power not to immediately back out, and shut down. Both himself, and the computer. Panic rushed through his bones as he turned to see Jack walking out of the bedroom she had been in, staring at her phone. 

He only calmed for a moment when she said, not looking up, that she had to head out for a bit, that she would be back in a few hours. He agreed, trying to sound disinterested, and not like his entire life was flashing through his life, again, for the second time this month. 

What was it about America that had him finding himself in trouble every day, and how did this keep happening to him?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a short one, but that's because the next one is very... uh... harsh? I can't think of the correct term rn but it's bad for one of the guys.


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> please be aware of the warnings, this chapters pretty rough

“There’s our boy!” Was the first thing he heard when Jack returned, apparently bringing Geoff with her. The man was walking towards Gavin, who had just managed to hide his information before they got in the door, pulling up a screen of another firewall that he had programmed, just to make it look like there was still work to be done. “What have you got for us today?” He seemed chipper, yet anxious, and Gavin could tell that he needed this done, and soon. 

“There’s a few more firewalls.” Gavin said, typing away, and purposefully making mistakes so that his information wouldn’t be revealed. Geoff was leaning over his shoulder, and Gavin couldn’t help but start to pump his leg anxiously. The room was quiet, his leg going up, down, up, down. It didn’t stop as he continued to work on the computer, his breath quickening as Geoff leaned in closer, his grasp tightening. 

“You’re lying.” He whispered, and Gavin burst out of the chair, panic kicking in as he tried to make it to the door, but he was on the floor before he could get his feet untangled from underneath the desk, Geoff pinning him to the ground with his arm behind his back. 

“What are you hiding?!” He demanded, holding the arm in a tight grasp, ignoring Gavin’s soft noises of pain. 

“Nothing!” Gavin yelled, desperately trying to get away. He thought he was doing so well. “It’s just not done!” He tried to convince them, but even to himself it sounded fake, and he could see Jack going to the computer. He knew his cover would be blown in an instant, and he stopped struggling. There was no point in lying anymore. 

“I didn’t know.” He let out, weak and pathetic. He hated it. 

The whole Golden Boy bullshit was because of this. This weakness, his fear of being hurt, of being in the line of danger. His golden record. 

“What do you mean?” Jack questioned from above, turning away from the computer. Geoff didn’t let up. 

“I didn’t know what I was doing. I needed a job, I needed something to do. I was going crazy, I had to find something.” Gavin started to explain, but Geoff leaning on him was really starting to take a toll on his breathing. Geoff didn’t seem like he was going to let up. 

“I didn’t know who they were.” He gasped out, free hand grasping for purchase on the cold, hardwood floor. He could feel himself starting to bruise. “I promise, I swear. They just-” He had to stop to breath, but Geoff didn’t move. He could feel the anger radiating off of the man. “They just showed up.” 

He couldn’t speak anymore, but Geoff didn’t seem to care. He was pinned to the ground for another couple seconds, before Geoff was gone, dragging him up by the arm, and pulling him towards one of the rooms in the hall. It was dark inside, with no lights and no windows. Gavin was thrown inside, and the door was locked as Geoff left. 

The panic didn’t disappear. He heard Geoff and Jack talking outside the room, Geoff close to yelling as Jack tried to reason with him. Eventually, the front door to the apartment slammed, and Gavin was left, completely alone in the dark, with nothing to be detected by any of his senses. 

He crawled towards where he thought the door was, his hand coming in contact with a smooth wall. He slid it up, feeling for a handle, hoping that he would get lucky, but there was no such luck. He continued along the wall, feeling for something, anything. He could feel the outline of the door, and continued his finger along the crack until he came to where he figured the handle would be. 

His fingers grasped at smooth wood, and he let out a noise of disbelief. 

There wasn’t a handle. He was truly stuck. 

He walked along the wall until he came to a corner on the other side of the room, sliding to the floor. He cursed himself for leaving his phone on the desk, but his eyes were heavy, blinking causing no change in vision. He sat in the dark, blinking, just trying to calm down. As the panic started to ebb away, his eyes grew heavy. It was just easier to leave his eyes closed, if there really was no difference…

He woke with a start when the door was slammed against the wall, the Vagabond standing across the room with fire in the eyes visible through the mask. The hallway light from the hall cast his shadow, tall and intimidating across the floor. A light from above was switched on in the hall, and Gavin shied away, trying to hid in the corner of the empty room. 

“Get up.” The Vagabond demanded, voice tense and tight. Gavin rose on shaking legs, genuine fear coursing through him now. He was handed a water bottle, and told to drink. When Gavin stared at it, calculating, the Vagabond took a threatening step forward, and Gavin downed the bottle quickly, eager to comply. 

They stood in silence for a moment, and then Geoff walked into the room, seemingly less angry than before, but still pretty pissed. 

“I didn’t-” 

“Shut up.” Geoff demanded, eyes boring into Gavin’s skull. His hands were shaking now, and he had to put the plastic water bottle down before he dropped it. “You’re going to explain exactly what the fuck happened. In full detail.” Geoff didn’t seem to be fucking around about anything right now, and Gavin began his story, stammering and anxious. He wasn’t usually like this.

It only took about fifteen minutes to explain what happened, and another half hour for Geoff to actually believe him. 

“Can you bring us to the office you were taken to?” The Vagabond spoke up for the first time, determined. Gavin thought about it for a second, but it seemed like that was too long, from the annoyance on Geoff’s face. 

“I think.” He eventually let out, and that was enough for the Vagabond, who grabbed his arm, hauling him out of the room and down the hall, ignoring Geoff’s protests. At the front door, he stopped turning to Geoff. “If this kid knows where those people are, I’m going. I’m not giving them a chance to take more of us out.” And with that, he was pulled out of the door to the apartment, and hustled into a familiar car. 

It took Gavin a while to figure out exactly where he had been taken, but the threat of his life hanging over his head was enough of an incentive. 

“I can’t go in.” Gavin insisted when they were parked in front of the building. The Vagabond was already gearing up, tucking extra bullets inside his shoes, belt, anywhere he could fit them, but he paused to send Gavin a glare. 

“You’re coming it. You’re not going to die.” The ‘yet’ was implied heavily, and the Vagabond grabbed a large gun from the back seat, Gavin shying away from it. “I know not every person in this office building is part of the gang that attacked us, so you’re going to tell me what way to go. I don’t trust you enough to communicate solely over ear piece, so you’re coming with me, and if you steer me wrong…” He left it there, and Gavin nodded quickly. 

They walked across the street, the Vagabond not even trying to hid the gun. It was getting dark, but the streets were still full. Pedestrians took a moment to realize there was a masked man walking across the sidewalk with a large gun, but by the time they started screaming, the pair was inside the building. The person who had frisked Gavin was standing by the elevator, and Gavin just nodded when the Vagabond glanced over at him. 

The person was now splattered on the door to the elevator, and Gavin felt his stomach turn. The doors opened with a soft ‘ding’ and Gavin almost protested. He couldn’t see in his mind’s eye what was about to come, and could feel bile rising in his throat. 

“What floor.” The Vagabond said from somewhere far away, past where his ears were ringing from the gunshot. Gavin hit the first floor button. 

The floors passed too fast for Gavin, as he repeated the death of the person at the front door in his head. He tried to blink it away, but their terrified expression was the only thing he saw when he closed his eyes. 

The doors opened again, and the Vagabond walked out. The flurry of activity Gavin remembered had halted, as most people working in the building stopped, heads turning as the first bullet was fired. 

Everything seemed to go in slow motion, bullets flying far too fast for anyone to escape them, and the sudden burst of screaming, papers flying. A woman crying. 

Gavin just watched, in front of the elevator. At one point, a man appeared with a gun, and a bullet glanced by his head. Time stopped for a moment for him as he saw the bullet approaching. He couldn’t move, he didn’t dare, and the bullet grazed his ear. 

There was a burning sensation that exploded where the bullet had gone by, and time went back to normal, too fast and too loud for Gavin to process. The Vagabond had only moved to walk up to the center of the room, shooting anything that moved, only pausing for a second to reload before downing anyone that dared try to escape. 

The firing stopped only when the Vagabond seemed convinced no one was left. The stench of death was everywhere, blood covering office dividers and computer screens. 

Gavin fell to his knees, and threw up.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> lmao oops i broke gav


	11. Chapter 11

It took Gavin a while to be able to stand on his own two feet. The Vagabond had to basically drag him out of the office they were in. His legs were weak and shaking, and he couldn’t get the smell of death out of his mind. His ear was bleeding seemingly endlessly. Whenever he tried to think of something else, his mind went to the corner cubicle, where a photo of a small, five year old girl was propped up on the wall. One of the Vagabond’s bullet went wayward at one point, and the portrait was shattered, and went falling to the floor. 

Gavin couldn’t think anymore. He was brought back to the apartment, given water, food and a bed, but he couldn’t think. He just stared at the wall in front of him, mind purposefully blank. At one point, he heard Geoff yelling at the Vagabond in the other room. The only sentence that reached him was “You broke him!” It carried across the apartment, and echoed in Gavin’s mind. 

Every echo sounded more and more far away, until he was gone, back home, a million miles away. 

In his grandfather's living room. Dan sat on the couch next to him, eagerly telling him stories, what he thought war was going to be like. Gavin was running through a bloody scene on the television in front of them, screaming when his character was blown up, and then dissolving into laughter. 

It was childish. It was familiar. It was safe. 

It took him a while to come back to himself, and even then, it felt different. He would never feel the same again, he knew. Even if he hadn’t fired the gun, he still felt the guilt hanging over his head from the thousands of people that had died from his work. Suddenly, it felt like he had shot every bullet that had been fired using the information he had gathered.

But he knew, it wasn’t him. Some part of his brain kept yelling that none of it was his fault, he was just a man trying to make a living. Trying to do something with the skill that he had spent so long honing. 

It was a week before he was able to walk around and function properly again. It was a two until he stopped hearing screaming in his mind, seeing blood behind his eyes. He was still left with his ear, slowing scabbing, then scarring over. The first week, he was welcome to stay in bed, but the Fake AH Crew had to start work on a heist soon, and he was taken to Jack’s apartment, away from plans or identities. 

She was a seemingly constant force, helping him through. She brought him food, water, anything he really needed. Eventually, he knew he would have to find a way to repay her hospitality and kindness, but he barely knew the woman in front of him. 

He made it a promise to himself to keep Jack as safe as he could, if he had a chance with the Fake AH Crew after this. 

It was three weeks before he approached the topic of going home. Jack hadn’t mentioned it once, but as soon as he brought it up, insisted that he only stay as long as he was comfortable. She also mentioned that she wouldn’t mind dropping by and checking on him, and refused to take no for an answer. 

When he was finally dropped off at home, he was informed that his laptop had already been returned, and his phone was charging on his bedside table. He thanked Jack for everything, and was about to climb out of the car when she stopped him, a gentle but firm arm on his bicep. 

A memory stick was pressed into his hand. “Geoff told me to give this to you.” She said, giving him a small, confident smile. “He knows how much you want to redeem yourself, so try to get this done by the end of the week, and we might give you another chance.” She winked, and Gavin stepped out of the car. 

She was down the street before he thought to thank her, and ask how she found his address.

The metal edges of the memory stick dug into his hands as he stood on the street, white knuckled from holding it too hard. This was his chance, his one redemption. He hadn’t ruined it all, it might be okay after all. 

He set to work immediately when he got home. He only had a few hours of work before someone knocked at his door. He tried to make himself look acceptable, and opened the door. Michael was standing there, looking confused, but holding two beers and a copy of the newest Halo. 

“Where’ve you been buddy?” Michael blurted out, and Gavin just smiled, opening the door wider so he could come in. He began telling the story of how he flew home for a couple nights to be with his grandfather, and lost track of the days. He told him of feeding ducks by the pond, and walking around his old neighborhood. 

The night was going well, until Michael asked about his ear. Gavin hadn’t thought of it in a while, and his mind was blank for far too long before he could make up an excuse. He stumbled through a lie about a cooking accident, but Michael didn’t press.

That night, when he fell asleep, he dreamed of death.

He spent half a week working on the information on the memory stick, and the second it was done, he saved the needed files to the memory stick, and called the number that had been included in the README. 

The phone rang through, and there was a beep. Then, the line went dead. Gavin looked at his phone, confused. He got a text message from an unknown number a second later, with ‘ETA: 5’ the only content in the message. 

He shoved his laptop into his backpack, holding the memory stick in his hand. He went downstairs to meet the car, and by the time he was down there, Jack’s car was already idling in front of his apartment. 

“It didn’t take you that long to contact us again.” She commented as he got in, and Gavin swallowed past his nerves. 

“I needed something to do.” He replied, and Jack nodded knowingly. He could feel her staring at the bags under his eyes, and the obvious signs of exhaustion around him. 

“Have you slept at all since we last saw you?” She asked, and Gavin didn’t answer right away. He tried, but every night he had nightmares, and wouldn’t sleep longer than a few hours. 

“I got a few hours here and there.” Gavin was able to squeeze out, and they went silent again. The ride was quick, Jack knowing every shortcut and side street in this city. They pulled up to the apartment that Gavin had been brought to last time, and he felt a chill run through his entire body. 

He was back. 

The entire exchange was quite quick, Geoff meeting them at the door to the apartment, and immediately uploading the files to the computer he had been working on last time. Gavin wasn’t really watching, as Jack had distracted him with the promise of coffee in the kitchen.

He was interrupted sipping his coffee with Geoff walking over, and handing him the memory stick. 

“I transferred the information to our guy, you’ve done good work, again.” Gavin took the hard drive, tucking it into his pocket. “If you’re still looking for something to do, we may have a couple things in mind.”

“Geoff, shouldn’t we give the kid a break for a couple days?” Jack asked quietly, but Gavin spoke up quietly, shaking his head. 

“I’m okay, really. I just want to work.” Jack still looked skeptical, but she didn’t press as Geoff stood up again. 

“Come with me, we need to just see a few more things, and then we can get you on payroll.” He sent Gavin a wink, and led him down the hall a few doors. The apartment was eerily quiet, and that’s when Gavin realized it was just Geoff and Jack here. “So, we’ve been planning something big for the past few months, but we haven’t been able to get access to the security system for monitoring, so things have come to a standstill.”

He opened the door to a room, one wall covered in a map of Los Santos. There was a large table in the center of the room, another computer setup in the corner of the room. On the roof, there was a projector, which Gavin assumed was to preserve the wall sized map. 

“This is where you’ll work on this for the next couple hours. Jack will watch over you again, and if you have any questions, just let her know. She’s been heading this so far, but hit a wall a couple weeks back. As soon as you get access to their systems, your job is done and we’ll take over.” Geoff explained, pointing towards the computer at a relatively clean desk, with two full water bottles sitting on the desk for him. 

Gavin knew this was his entire future on the line now, and set to work quickly. Jack came in and gave him access to all the information she needed, and Gavin dived head first back into his work. He barely heard Geoff leave. 

The work was hard, but Gavin knew this best. He had coded a program for this exact thing, that gave him access to every city surveillance camera, and even though this was much more difficult, it was the same progress. 

It was around a half hour after he started, and he heard someone else enter the room. The person was quiet, and the chill ran through his spine again. He didn’t have to turn around to know it was the Vagabond. 

They didn’t speak. 

About two hours later, he was getting close, but his exhaustion was wearing him down. He rubbed his eyes for the fifth time in the past couple minutes, when the door opened again, and he heard someone clear their throat. The next thing he knew, another coffee was set down next to him. “You should have taken a break.” Jack spoke up, and Gavin shook his head, bringing the coffee closer to him. 

“I’m almost there, I just have a couple more firewalls to get through.” Gavin said between sips of the coffee. It was black, nothing added to it, and as much as it made him want to gag, he could already feel the caffeine propping him up a little. 

“You still could have taken a couple hours of sleep, we have a room specifically for that.” Jack sipped her own coffee, leaning against the desk. The Vagabond thanked her quietly as she handed him a paper cup, which Gavin turned to see how he would go about drinking. After noticing him looking, the Vagabond leveled him with a cold glare, and left the room momentarily. “Don’t worry about him, he’ll warm up to you. He’s nervous around strangers.” Jack cracked a smile, and Gavin didn’t laugh, sipping his coffee silently. 

He would have thought an accomplice in multiple murders would have been at least acquaintances. 

The coffee helped perk him up, and as Jack stood over him, Gavin got back to work, eventually breaking through the final layers of defenses. He paused in awe for a moment, looking over the building that the cameras were now showing him.

Jack stepped out of the room, immediately dialing Geoff on her phone.

Geoff was there in a couple minutes, Gavin just staring at the screen in front of him in pride. Clapping him on the shoulder, he nodded at the screen, clicking through the cameras until he was satisfied. “That’s what we needed. Thanks buddy.” As he was guided out of the room, two people were led back inside by the Jack, who was speaking quickly to them. The coffee cup was gone. 

“We’ll wire some money to you in the next few hours, but for tonight, just stay home. In fact, maybe stay out of the streets for about three days.” Geoff smirked to himself, and led him to the elevator. “You’ll be protected of course, but there will be a lot going on, and we can’t guarantee our demolitions guy won’t go a little overboard.” As the doors opened to the garage, Geoff stayed in the elevator as Gavin walked out. “We’ll be in contact.” 

With that, he was gone. And Gavin was left alone in the garage.


	12. Chapter 12

When Gavin finally got home a little while later, after paying a taxi, he trailed up to his apartment. Wanting something to distract himself, he knocked at Michael’s door, but got no answer. So he was left to his own devices. Geoff’s warning echoed in his ear, so he walked up to the roof. Looking out across the city, he tried to visualize where the cameras had been. The city seemed endless from where he stood, and he couldn’t help but feel small in the grand scheme of things.

He had done what he wanted, it seemed he was now in with the crew, but they had dismissed him without a second thought once he had finished what they wanted from him. For all Gavin knew, they would never call him again, or he would never progress past the point he was in. 

Sure, he was likely making a living wage, as it seemed the crew knew what they were doing, but it didn’t feel like he actually did anything important. 

It all felt unfinished, because he didn’t know if the job was actually done or not. 

Maybe he was just tired, he reasoned to himself, so Gavin went back downstairs, ignoring the fact that the sun was barely setting. 

He woke up well past noon the next day, the fog of sleep still lingering around him. Less than an hour later, he heard what sounded like hundreds of police cars outside his window, but didn’t dare to look. He went about his day slowly, the week of next to no sleep catching up to him. Gavin made some food, then went back to his bedroom, putting a movie on his tv. 

At some point, he dozed off, and awoke a few hours later to someone knocking at his door. He dragged himself out of bed again, carrying his dishes to the kitchen and dropping them off in the sink before going to the door. 

Michael was standing on the other side, and Gavin swore he could smell burning, but ignored it. He didn’t care anymore. “Gavin, go get pants on and grab some swim trunks, we’re going out!” Michael said, and his voice sounded like he’d been shouting a lot recently.

Gavin purposefully didn’t think about.

He got dressed, and when he got back to the door, Michael was holding three small cases of beer. “I got some food in the car too, we haven’t really hung out recently so I figured we could have some lunch and just talk, you know?” He seemed restless, but again, Gavin ignored it. He knew that the next few hours would be feigning ignorance about the majority of what was going on, but he didn’t care. 

Michael was his friend now, as much as it made the work difficult. 

He was hustled into a car with tinted windows, and they left the city in their dust as they tore into the desert. They both wailed along to the radio, and ignored it when the radio announcer would break through and talk about the latest heist held by the Fake AH Crew. They didn’t talk about it. 

When they finally came to a stop about two hours outside the city, they were at a lake. Gavin didn’t question why they came here instead of the beach. They swam for a little while, after downing a few beers, and Gavin slowly felt his regular energy come back to him. 

The city was far behind them, and they both felt like they could leave who they were there behind. There were just two young men, swimming and drinking the evening away. 

They were out well into the night, the moon high in the sky when they both decided to get out of the water, and give Michael some time to sober up before they drove back home. Laying on the beach, they looked out at the still lake, Gavin taking another sip of the beer in his hand as Michael finished up the water bottle he had been drinking for the past hour. “You know, I have another little house out here, like ten minutes away. We could just stay there, if you want.” Michael spoke up, and Gavin nodded. 

After a little longer of looking out at the lake, Michael stood up, pulling Gavin to his feet. He stumbled a bit, and spilt the beer in his hand onto his leg, but he didn’t mind. The booze had him feeling warm on the inside, and more alive than he had in awhile. 

Piling back into the car, Gavin grabbed a container of strawberries from the grocery bag in the backseat, shoving one into his mouth. They had decimated the burgers that Michael had brought with them hours previous, but the fruit was saved for when they were drunk and forgot to drink water. 

Gavin didn’t know if that would actually help, but he still ate three more strawberries in succession with a pleased hum. 

They pulled up to a small house with a one car garage attached to it, and Michael turned off the car, leading Gavin up the stairs into the house. He was in charge of the bags, and shoved the various fruits into the fridge when Michael pointed it out to him, not taking them out of the bag. 

He looked around after finishing his duties, and noticed it was surprisingly well furnished, but still scarce. The only thing that looked remotely personalized was the Xbox and controllers. He pointed them out to Michael, who immediately began talking about the artist he had commissioned to customize them, and Gavin just nodded along, not quite following the conversation but still enjoying the sound of Michael’s voice when he was excited about something. 

“What games do you have?” He asked when Michael stopped, dropping down onto the soft couch. Michael listed of some games, and Gavin picked one at random, and they loaded it into the Xbox, and set down to play. At some point, he began drifting off, and set down the game controller. Michael turned off multiplayer, and continued on by himself, as Gavin watched the screen next to him, head resting on the side of the couch. 

It was quiet, and nice, and Gavin wasn’t used to this. He wasn’t this used to being so comfortable around someone that he was able to fall asleep around someone else this easily. Maybe it was the bevs, but he clonked out pretty quickly. The sleep was deep, and when he finally woke up again, the sun was up and the house was empty. 

As he sat up from the couch, Gavin realized he had a thin blanket draped over him, and the beer bottle he had been cradling had been set on the table in front of him. He couldn’t help but smile at the domestic aura around the action.

He sat up, and got his bearings quickly when he noticed the game was still open on the screen, but was muted. He heard the door open behind him, and glanced over, where Michael had two brown bags in his hand. 

“Hey, you’re up!” Michael smiled, and tossed him one of the bags. Inside was a small breakfast meal from a diner they had passed the previous night. Gavin smiled in thanks, and they both sat on the couch, eating quietly. 

The morning passed like this, quiet and calm, and much more comfortable than the previous morning. Gavin took the calm to pester Michael to take him back to the lake, still in his swim shorts from the previous night, when he had been too tired or drunk to change back into his regular shorts, and succeeded after about ten minutes of trying. 

They were on the shore of the lake when Michael got a call on his phone. He glanced at the number, and gestured to Gavin to wait there, as he got back into the car, closing the door so he was unable to be heard. 

Gavin ignored whatever was going on in there, until Michael stepped out of the car again, looking pissed off. “I have to run back into the city for work, I can drop you off at the house if you want, and there’s a four wheeler in the garage if you want to come back to the beach, or you can come with me.” He took a second to think about it, but decided to stay out here, where he was safe from whatever was going down in the city.

Plus, he had a seemingly endless supply of beer and food, and access to an Xbox, so he would be okay for now. 

Michael got them back to the house in half the time it usually took, speeding down the empty streets. He didn’t even turn off the car when they pulled into the driveway, and only got out for long enough to fling the garage door open. “If you want to go back to the lake, take this, just leave a note on the counter in case I need to pick you up.” 

With that, he was gone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have a little bit of writers block rn, but I still have like 6 more chapters prepared, so it should be okay. Hope everyone going to RTX London have a great time this weekend :)


	13. Chapter 13

Gavin did end up back at the lake, drinking the day away and swimming whenever he got too warm. It was a lazy day, and he was able to forget a lot of what was happening in his life, just laying on the warm sand and looking around the desert. Before he had headed out, he had grabbed a container of sunscreen, as well as a few containers of the fruit. He had found a cooler in the garage, and filled it with ice, storing his beer, fruit, and water in it. The day passed slowly, and as the sun was setting, Gavin figured it would be a good idea to head back to the house. 

Michael still wasn’t back when he got to the house, so he made himself a frozen meal that he found in the freezer, and entertained himself for the next few hours on Netflix. 

He woke up the next morning, and was still alone. At this point, he was getting a little worried, and laying by the lake drinking was getting boring. He didn’t know when Michael was coming back, and had no way to contact him, since they had never exchanged numbers. 

That, and his phone was dead anyway. He spent the day wandering around the house, trying to find something to do, or a way to contact Michael. There were no neighbors around, and Gavin didn’t believe that Michael would have left any information with the neighbors anyway. 

It was another few hours before he heard a car door slam, and Michael walked in the door. He looked pissed off, and didn’t really talk about where he’s been. Gavin didn’t think that asking him what was going on was the best idea. 

“I need to go back again, but I figured I should probably give you the chance to go home. This might be a long time, and I didn’t want to just abandon you here with a four wheeler.” He could tell that Michael was carefully controlling his voice, as so he didn’t sound as stressed out as he was. He decided not to push that by irritating him, or asking him what was going on, and just nodded, grabbing his dead phone from the table. 

He hadn’t brought anything else with him, so they were pretty much set to head out. The drive was silent, the radio off, and Michael’s knuckles were white on the steering wheel. Gavin shifted uncomfortably on his seat, unsure of himself. He knew Michael wasn’t upset with him, but he couldn’t help but feel the anger in the car was still directed towards him. 

When they got back to the apartment, Gavin was finally able to charge his phone. He left it on his bedside, and hopped onto his computer, just browsing online before he checked his email. 

He had fifteen new emails in his work email. 

“What the hell?” He mumbled to himself, opening the oldest one. As he read through it, his blood ran cold. He continued reading through the emails, and got more and more worried as the emails began to get more frantic. 

Gavin jumped when his phone started ringing. He ran out of the room, and grabbed his phone, immediately answering it. 

“Hello?” His heart was pounding out of his chest, and he hadn’t even checked the caller ID in his panic. 

“Someone is waiting outside of your apartment, we need you down here asap.” The voice was unrecognizable, again, but Gavin knew that he had no choice at this point. He grabbed his bag, which still had his laptop in it from his last trip, and headed out of his apartment. 

He hadn’t even been home for half an hour, but Gavin was happy to leave again, to have something important to do. 

He got into the car, and the Vagabond just nodded at him, not saying anything as he sped through the streets. Gavin really wasn’t sure what was happening, the email really only stating that they needed contact with him, and then the increasing frustration when he didn’t reply. 

When they got to the apartment building, Gavin was met on the first floor by a fuming Geoff, and an evercalm Jack. “Where have you been?!” Geoff exploded, and the Vagabond left him to deal with this himself. 

“I left town for a couple days, you said to stay out of harm's way!” Gavin replied, confused as to why he was being yelled at. “My phone died.” He cut in when he saw Geoff about to bring it up. They both fell silent, and Jack decided to speak up. 

“It doesn’t matter where you were. We need your help now. It seems one of our own has a contact with people who really don’t like what we’re doing here. We need you to find out who that is, and quickly. We’re really not doing great on time.” He was led to the same room, but this time, the map on the wall had been torn down, and that alone made his blood run cold. 

He was lead to the computer, and left alone for the first time since he had been locked in a room, but he was clearly free now, the door left open behind them as Jack, Geoff and the Vagabond continued the work they needed to do. He tried to ignore the leftover panic from being in this apartment alone. 

Instead, he gathered the information he needed from the papers sitting on the large table, and set to work. Every couple minutes, someone would yell in the hall and a new piece of information would appear in his email, or a paper would be rushed in, but Gavin approached it differently, working around the information that had already been found, and going the direction that no one else seemed to be going through. 

Which made his progressions much slower than the other alerts, but it paid off once he was able to find a pivotal piece of information, and sent it the the rest of the email chain he had attached to. No one noticed for a few minutes, and then the information was swarmed, the discussion flared back up, and people started to seem excited. Gavin didn’t speak up, figuring that he should focus on the work instead of gloating. 

The work was long and tedious, and at some point, Jack came in followed by two other people who had been working with them last time, holding food for him, as well as an armload of physical information. She personally delivered his lunch, glancing at the computer and nodding to herself. She didn’t interrupt him, and left him to their work after the food was handed over. As the day wore on into evening, people signed off and were immediately replaced by others, but Gavin stayed where he was, frantically typing away at the computer. 

The process they had made was impressive, and Gavin felt proud of his contributions, but he never spoke up about it. It’s not that he didn’t want recognition for his work, because he did, typically he was pretty braggy about these types of things. But today didn’t seem like the time or place for that type of thing. 

He wasn’t the one that eventually found whoever it was, but it didn’t bother him. These people had far more personal information about their target than he did, but there was a small bit of pride in him that the information he had found had been somewhat helped the investigation. 

Leaning back in his chair, he rubbed his tired eyes, and checked the time for the first time that night. He had been working on this for seven hours already, and any rest that he had gained over the past two days had suddenly left him, his eyes aching from staring at his screen for so long. He still had to make it home, however, so he tried to shake off the irritation. 

Geoff came in for a couple minutes once they had confirmed the target, and the information had been all been compiled. He nodded to him, and Gavin picked up his backpack, muffling a quiet groan when his legs and back cracked from sitting for that long in the same spot. 

As he was heading towards the door, his arm was grabbed and his flight instinct kicked in, as he pulled away. The only thing that really stopped him running was the glint in the Vagabond’s ice cold eyes. That, and the fact that he seemed to appear out of nowhere.

“You need to come with me.” Gavin tried to quiet the panic, and nodded, trying to appear calm. He followed the Vagabond, keeping his head down. He tried to ignore the thoughts of blood and gore that had resurfaced in his tired mind, trying to convince himself there was no reason for the Vagabond to bring him to one of those places again. 

He was taken to another room, which looked like a bedroom, with a large, comfortable couch in the corner. He tried to think who could be living here, if it was Geoff, the Vagabond, or another one of the members of the Fake AH Crew he hadn’t met but he didn’t speak up. He was told to wait on the couch, and he couldn’t help but think back to the first time he had met the part of the crew he had now. 

Part of him wished he had taken a different approach to this all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> oh boy this is late in the day but it's been a rough week for me guys, sorry. next chapter, a few loose threads are brought together, so I hope you enjoy it :)


	14. Chapter 14

Geoff came into the room, without Jack for a rare occasion. He took a seat on the arm chair opposite, and ran a hand through his hair, sighing. Gavin knew he probably wouldn’t like the conversation that would follow. “Where were you?” Geoff asked after a minute of silence. “I know I told you to stay out of harm's way, I get that. But we had no way to contact you when things go to shit.”

Gavin frowned, feeling a little upset that he was being yelled at, but this guy wasn’t his boss, or his dad. He had no right here. “I’m not being forced to stay in the city, am I? I wanted to get out for a few days with a friend. It’s not like I missed a shift, or something.” He argued, and Geoff opened his mouth to retort, then closed it. He wasn’t wrong. 

“I get it, okay? I do. There are other crews or gangs to work with in this city. But loyalty is the biggest thing here. You already-”

“I wasn’t working for someone else.” He gritted out between closed teeth. Gavin didn’t want to lose his contacts here, when he just started, but this was pissing him off. He was an adult, he could take care of himself. He learned his lesson the first time, his nightmares wouldn’t let him forget it. 

“How can I know that? We’ve worked with you three times, including today. There’s no trust at all, especially what happened last time I saw you. I don’t even know your name.” Geoff admitted, and Gavin thought back, realizing that no, he’d only really been called by nicknames, or his alias. “I’m not calling you Golden Boy, it’s bad enough with Vagabond, and now-” 

“It’s Gavin.” He interrupted, and Geoff shut his mouth for a second, before nodding once.

“Geoff.” He replied, and held out his hand. Gavin shook it, and they went back to silence again. “This isn’t over.” Geoff said, finally. “You’re going to be assigned someone to watch you, so that we don’t lose contact again. We probably could have handled this eventually, but if something had gone wrong in the heist, we would have been fucked, while you were off being trailer trash.” 

“I don’t need someone watching me, I’m not a kid!” 

“I don’t care. You went off the grid, and yeah, you’re not fully a part of us, but you could be. We just need to know we can trust you again.” Gavin’s heart swelled at his words. If he just went along with it for now, it would probably speed the process to becoming a part of this crew. 

He couldn’t remember when he wanted to become a part of the crew, but he did now. With all his being, he wanted this. 

“Fine.” Gavin finally gave in, and Geoff nodded, a hint of a smile coming onto his face. 

“Thankfully, I think you already know this person, so you don’t have to worry about awkward first times.” The smile was fully there now, and he pulled out his phone, sending a quick text. “He’ll be here in a few minutes, and I’ll just explain what’ll be going on until then.”

He explained that the person wouldn’t be staying with him, but during the day when they weren’t busy with heists, the person would stay around. This would also help him out, so if he got into some trouble, he wouldn’t have to waste time getting in contact with them. 

It didn’t sound that bad, Gavin was still able to work on his own stuff, and this person wouldn’t bother him too much. It was more like a roommate than anything, a roommate that only hung around in the day, and didn’t eat his food. 

“Geoff, what’s this?” A eerily familiar voice asked.

“Gavin, meet your… watcher.” Gavin turned to the door, and met Michael’s eyes. 

He fucking knew it. 

“Why the fuck is my neighbor here.” Michael was pissed. Geoff smiled, amused, leaning back on his seat. 

“You’re going to be watching him for me. He went off the grid for a bit, but we can’t afford to lose him. It’s not a big deal, Micha-” 

“Was this who we were fucking looking for yesterday? He was at my fucking safe house, you fucking idiot!” Michael was close to shouting, but he composed himself for a second. “I’m not a babysitter, Geoff. I’m an explosives expert, what the fuck do you want me to do?” 

Gavin didn’t know what to say about this, so he just stayed out of it, picking at a loose thread on the sofa. 

“You two seem to get along fine on your own, so I figured this was the perfect pair. Jack agreed.” The last sentence seemed to hold the most weight to Michael, and he stopped arguing for a second, but still mumbled to himself.

“Are you two ready to stop being babies about this?” Geoff questioned, and Gavin could tell he was boring of the conversation. Gavin stood up, adjusting his backpack. “Good. Get out of my fucking apartment.” 

The two left his apartment quickly, but Michael was still upset. Gavin didn’t know what to do, but he wasn’t one to stay quiet during this type of situation. “Michael, I-”

“Gavin. I swear to god, if you don’t shut the fuck up right now, I’m going to punch you in the fucking jaw.” Michael snapped, and stormed towards the elevator. Gavin assumed he was going to be left behind, but Michael did stop for a moment for Gavin to get in. 

So, Gavin followed Michael to his car, and they started back to the apartment. About halfway there, Michael finally spoke up. “What the fuck, Gav? Who the fuck are you?” He demanded, stubbornly keeping his head towards the road, though Gavin knew he could drive perfectly fine when not looking. 

“Geoff didn’t tell you?” Gavin questioned, playing with the straps on his bag. He didn’t like Michael being upset with him. 

“I got a fucking text telling me to go to Geoff’s room, then I walked in. I probably know less than you, because apparently all I am is a fucking bodyguard.” Michael bristled at the thought again, shooting through a red light as the car sped up. 

Gavin looked out the front window, watching as other cars rushed past into their rearview mirror. He didn’t think they were going to the apartment anymore. “It’s not my fault, Michael! I didn’t know-” 

“You didn’t know what, Gavin? You didn’t know that you were working for one of the biggest crew in Los fucking Santos? You didn’t know how much fucking danger that puts you in? What the fuck didn’t you know?” They shot past the apartment at least 30 over the speed limit. 

Gavin fell silent again, and left Michael to calm down. They drove well out of town, and he began to get nervous. However, he knew now that Michael wasn’t allowed to kill him, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t rough him up. 

But Michael just kept driving. The road was dark ahead of them, but he seemed to know exactly where he was going. They were twenty minutes out of town when he suddenly stopped outside an old, rundown house. 

He didn’t say a word as he got out, slamming the car door behind him, but Gavin knew to follow. He was led into an old house, which looked like it hadn’t been used in at least five years, after it had been burnt out by something. Whatever happened, it was big. “Michael, where are we?” 

He didn’t get an answer for a while, as Michael looked around the room. He looked haunted, his shoes crunching on the ground as he walked across broken glass, and other types of debris. Gavin kept looking around, worry growing with each second. He didn’t like this one bit. 

“Gavin, what did you really do, back in England? Why did you come here?” Michael asked, staring at something on the ground. Gavin saw no reason to lie anymore, shuffling his feet in the debris. 

“I was a hacker. One of the highest in demand. But I got bored.” He was met with silence again, so he went on. “I’ve been doing stuff like this for years, since I was a teenager. This is just a bigger scale.” 

“Do you have anyone back home? Anyone you care about?” The subject changed quick enough that it almost gave Gavin whiplash, but he focused on it, thinking. Then, he shook his head. 

“My parents left me with my grandfather at birth, and he passed away a few years before I got into this.” It still hurt to talk about, but the pain was dull and faded. His grandfather had been his rock, but everyone has their time, he supposed. 

“When I moved to Los Santos, I wasn’t alone.” Michael spoke up, and the words sounded heavy. “It was me, my mom and my brother.” His words were slow, as if he were still trying to process them. “I couldn’t find a job, and my mom wasn’t doing too well. So I found work as an underling. I just did the dirty work half the time for small crews, but I did it for long enough that I started to work my way up.” He stopped, never moving his eyes from what he was staring at in the corner. 

“I was making enough to support my mom, and we were happy.” He took a deep breath, finally turning away from the corner. Gavin didn’t see anything of importance over there, it just seemed like a burned up arm chair, but it likely held some significance to Michael. 

“It went this way for a few months, and then Geoff contacted me about a small job. I was overjoyed, I felt like I was finally making something of myself.” He met Gavin’s eyes, and he understood that Michael knew how he felt about finally being something for the crew. “It was just small, but it pissed somebody off. By the time I got home that night, this is what the place looked like.” Gavin looked around the house, burnt and crumbling around them. 

“I never saw my mom, or my brother again. I don’t know what happened to them.” Michael didn’t break eye contact. He looked more sad than angry at this point, but Gavin could still see the smoldering rage in his gaze. “I don’t want that to happen to you, Gav.” 

They both were silent for a bit, Gavin thinking about his own family, the family he had never known. 

He felt nothing.

Michael seemed to see him reach this conclusion in his mind, and finally looked away, heading back towards the front door. They were silent all the way back to the apartment. They split at the door to Gavin’s apartment, Michael leaving him with four final words. 

“Family isn’t always blood.”


	15. Chapter 15

Michael was quiet the whole drive back, significantly less angry, replaced with something else. Something heavier, something that Gavin didn’t know how to deal with. He stared out the window, tapping his finger on the wheel. The radio was quiet between them, but it the memories would have overpowered any noise that was exposed now. 

Gavin let out a breath he didn’t know he was holding when he finally got out of the car in front of their apartment. It was early morning, but he was too exhausted from the work, and emotional strain that had been thrust on him. Michael didn’t go to his own apartment.

“You don’t have to watch me, I’m just going to sleep.” Gavin told him as he unlocked the door, stepping into the apartment. It still didn’t feel like home. Michael didn’t say a word, going to the kitchen and pulling a beer out of his fridge. Gavin opened his mouth to protest, but with a glare he was silent again. “Alright well. You know where the Xbox games are, I have a spare charger on the table if you need to it. I’m going to pass out.” 

He left Michael sitting on his couch, drinking a beer, and staring at the blank tv. 

He hated this. 

He hated that Michael was angry at him for something out of his control. He hated that Michael was angry for something he loved doing.

He just wanted to sleep, and when he woke up all of this would be over. He would wake up to an empty apartment, and go back to his work. That’s all he wanted right now, he wasn’t good with emotions. 

Gavin dreamed of home that night. He dreamed of the last time he had seen his grandfather, lying sick on his hospital bed. He dreamed of his best friend getting his draft letter, and of being left completely alone, in a big world. 

When he woke up, the world was dark. Michael had gone home, if the silence from his living room indicated anything, and he was alone. 

Part of him hated it. He stayed in his bed, curled around his phone as he scrolled through reddit, still tired, but not wanting to succumb to dreams again. Eventually, he pulled himself out of bed, so he could distract himself with Xbox. He stopped in the doorway, where the light from the TV revealed Michael, passed out on his couch. 

“Michael?” Gavin breathed, surprised. He was sure that Michael would have gone home by the time it got dark. Then he remembered what he had been shown a few hours previous, and started to understand. 

Michael shot awake the second Gavin took a step into the room, grabbing the gun that had been hidden by his coffee table. He was aimed at Gavin’s forehead in seconds, and Gavin knew he could have been dead already if Michael hadn’t hesitated. 

His breaths came quickly as he stared down the barrel of the gun to Michael’s eyes, who were calculating, and sharp. There was a hint of fear behind them. The gun was lowered slowly, but Michael was still on high alert, eyes quickly surveying the apartment around him. When he deemed it safe, he put the gun back where he had got it from. “Why are you up?” 

Gavin had to take a moment to come back to reality, unclenching his fists. “I couldn’t sleep.” He was sure his eyes were still dark from exhaustion, his unstable sleeping schedule taking its toll, but Michael didn’t say anything. He sat back on the couch, and offered an Xbox controller. 

They didn’t talk about it, but they entered a game, something soothing that Gavin hadn’t even realized that he owned. They played for a few minutes in quiet until he spoke up. “Geoff said that you wouldn’t be stay here.” Michael tensed up at that, letting out a sigh.

“I know.” Was all he said, forcefully casual, and they both went back to the game. The soft piano soundtrack soothed Gavin, his nightmares forgotten as they worked their way through level after level. Eventually, Gavin gave in to the sleep that was heavy behind his eyes, and quit. Michael kept going without him, as they said goodnight and Gavin left the room. 

By the morning, they were fine. Gavin had some cereal, and they argued about which should go first, the milk or cereal, for about twenty minutes until Michael stormed out of the kitchen.

Michael began to get restless after being stuck in Gavin’s apartment for hours on end, and he had ‘work’ to do at the apartment/office, but refused to leave Gavin alone, so he was bullied out of his own home into Michael’s car. He was extremely curious about what kind of work an explosives expert for one of the biggest crews in the city would have for office work, so he wasn’t that upset about it. 

The place was quiet, Geoff greeting them with a smug smile when they walked in, and Michael led him down the hall to a room that was mostly exposed concrete. In the corner, there was a neat workbench with a pile of paper on it. Around the walls were neatly organized and safely stored in metal shelves. 

It was shocking how stark and clean the place was. When Gavin imagined where Michael would work, he imagined a room with burn marks on the walls, and chemicals misplaced everywhere. 

Thinking about it, he was glad that it wasn’t. 

Michael took a seat at the workbench, and pointed to a plastic chair beside the desk. “Don’t touch anything.” He demanded, and set to work, filling out paper and checking his inventory. Michael buzzed around the room steadily, counting bottles and containers with things that were far beyond Gavin’s understanding. 

“Michael?” He spoke up after about five minutes of quiet.

“What, Gavin?” Michael replied while writing something down on a clipboard. 

“What’s the least lethal thing in this room?” 

“You.” Gavin pouted, kicking the leg of the table in response. Michael barely knew anything about him, especially not anything about his record, but he wasn’t wrong, not even close. 

The bottle of water sitting on the table across from him could probably hurt him if it tried hard enough. 

Gavin reached out, and knocked it over. Michael sent him a weird look, but didn’t say anything. 

Eventually, he just gave up trying to distract Michael, who was very focused on what was in front of him, and just went on his phone, scrolling through different camera’s around the city. 

He followed a police cruiser for a while, watching it as it chased a car down a highway. Once the car split off, he followed the car instead, jumping quickly between cameras until he lost track of it, then went back to absentmindedly monitoring the streets. 

It took Michael about an hour to get through what he needed, and then he had to actually go and buy the stuff that he was running low on. At this point, Gavin was bored out of his mind, and getting fidgety. 

“Michael, I want to drive!” Gavin yelled once they got outside, running towards the car and climbing into the car. Michael just walked up to the car, and pulled the door open.

“Get the hell out of my car. If you really want to drive, we’re taking a different car.” Gavin complied, realizing that he didn’t really know how to even start Michael’s car, and he really didn’t want to owe Michael thousands of dollars immediately. 

He was led to the back corner of the garage, where a literally pile of shit on wheels was sitting. He relayed this thought to Michael, and his loud laughter seemed to agree with him. 

He was tossed the keys, and got into the car, and immediately had no clue what to do. Michael got into the passenger seat, and glanced over at the driver's side. “You said you wanted to drive, so.” He gestured in front of them. “Drive.”

Gavin put the key in the ignition, trying to think back to the times that Dan tried to teach him how to drive. Only a small portion of the information seemed to stick, as he barely knew how to get the car moving. 

After about two minutes of working through his memories, Michael finally spoke up to help him out. It was another ten minutes before they made it out of the parking garage, and at that point, Michael was done waiting. 

“Alright, pull into this parking space by the entrance.” Gavin followed his instructions, but still whined about it. 

“I was getting better Michael, I got us here!” 

“I don’t want to have to escape the police in this shitty thing if I let you out on the road though. I’ll get a car out of town sometime over the next couple weeks, and then you can drive around the desert all you fucking want, okay?” Michael reasoned, getting out as soon as Gavin had turned the car off. He still frowned, but got out, trailing behind back to Michael’s car. 

He had to admit, the drive back home was a lot shorter than it would have been if he drove. He tried to make the two of them dinner, but was eventually kicked out of the kitchen by Michael, after almost setting his hair on fire. 

As he sat himself down on the counter farthest from the stove, he heard Michael mumble something to himself. He wasn’t able to quite catch it all, but he gathered he was complaining about not knowing what Gavin did without him. 

Sometimes, he didn’t even know.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know it happened a while back but I wanted to say thank you for 200 kudos, and for such an amazing response to this fic! I have the rest of the fic all planned out, so soon there will be a set amount of chapters (I still don't know how many yet)


	16. Chapter 16

The week went like that, and Gavin fell into a routine around Michael. Only one night out of the week, did he have his apartment to himself. 

It was strange, sharing a living space. And while Geoff reminded them constantly that Michael didn’t have to be around constantly, he insisted that it was fine. They learned to work around each other, and by the end of the week, the apartment felt too empty when he was gone. It was strange not to hear him yelling at a video game in his living room, or bustling around the kitchen making food, which cursing Gavin for not having anything in his fridge besides frozen food that he usually just threw in the microwave. 

The apartment was silent that night, and Gavin tried to ignore that it bothered him. Without Michael’s constant noise, his mind had to make up for it, and the sounds that it brought forwards made Gavin flinch away from windows and dark corners. 

He was a grown man, he shouldn’t be acting like this, he told himself as he laid in bed that night, staring out to the bright street outside his window. He watched a woman walk down the street, swaying as she softly sang to herself. Her voice was quiet, but still floated up through the window. She was obviously drunk, and yet Gavin was still thankful that she was out there. It comforted him for a moment, reminded him that not everything in this city was broken. Maybe just bruised. 

It was another week before he had any form of work, and he drove Michael insane from being stuck in the house. They hadn’t been able to get out driving, because the car they originally were going to use to teach him how to drive actually broke. Michael kept trying to find a car to steal, but hadn’t been putting too much effort into it. 

Gavin loved to bring it up when they were just walking down the street, pointing at random cars that he knew nothing about, and asking Michael to steal it for him. Most of the time, he was ignored by anyone passing by, but did receive his fair share of looks. He always took glee in those, laughing when they were out of earshot. 

Once, he did get the attention of the owner of the car, who set down his groceries, rolling his sleeves back, and approaching Gavin, thoroughly pissed off. Michael took one swing at the guy, and downed him, then rushed Gavin down the street, into an alley and up a fire escape to a roof. 

He had to muffle his laughter as the guy ran down the alley, swearing and yelling at the brick wall. The bruise blossoming on the guy’s eyebrow was clear. Michael ushered him down the other side of the building, and they continued down the street without any other interruptions. 

When he did finally receive work from Geoff, he was over the moon. It was simple work, just casing a nearby bank, and finding a way to get rid of any security footage. “We’re trying to be sneaky this time,” the email eloquently stated, and Gavin set to work. 

He was able to find a blueprint pretty easily, and spent the day marking down in sharpie the location of the camera’s, and monitoring the security guards, when they switched shifts. He knew that he would need at least a week to ensure that it was on a pattern, but he had time. 

The heist was planned in a month's time, but Gavin would only need a week and a half to finish his portion of the work. He spent most of the week locked in his office, but he could hear Michael through the door, doing something to make time pass. He had become increasingly stir-crazy when he heard the news a heist was being planned, and one night he physically pulled Gavin away from the computer to drive them up to Chiliad and set off some fireworks. 

As much as he enjoyed his time that night, he knew it had set him back a day in his research. The next day when Michael tried to convince him to do the same, it physically hurt him to say no. That night, Michael spent the night in his own apartment, but Gavin was too sucked into the camera feed to notice the silence wrapping itself around him again. 

He jumped when a plate of warm food was set down next to him, Michael sipping a coffee next to him. “You haven’t had anything to eat in fifteen hours, Geoff will be pissed if I let you starve on the job.” He stated, and took a seat on the couch that he had dragged into the room the first day of Gavin’s preparation for the heist. 

It was supposed to be a place for him to take a nap, but Michael had been using it more than Gavin did. “Explain to me what you’re doing.” He said, looking on the screen. 

The guards had just changed shifts, and if the routine was right, Gavin had a half hour before anything moved, so in that time, he explained to Michael the progress of hacking into the camera’s without alerting anyone else who may be watching the footage of his presence. After, he explained the chart he had set up, stating the shift time of the security guards and their locations. 

Michael looked like he was lost for a while there, but nodded along to what Gavin was saying, so he powered through the explanation. Once he was done, it seemed Michael had a basic understanding, when he asked how that would help the heist. 

“Geoff wants you guys getting in there without anyone noticing, so I’m trying to figure out a way to get you in the vault without anyone being around. Thankfully, this is a smaller bank, so there’s about a five minute window where no one is around the vault as the guards switch shifts. I just need to figure out a way to get you to the vault without anyone else noticing you, but that’s why I’m monitoring the position of the other guards, to find a path.” 

“Once we’re in though, we only have five minutes to grab all we can and go?” Michael questioned, and Gavin hesitated. 

“Well, no. My plan right now is to start our attack from the back. That way, if the police do get called, you’ll be out the front door and in the escape vehicle. I don’t see a possible way to get you in and out unnoticed, even through the back entrance I found.” He explained patiently, and waited for Michael to nod his understanding. 

Most of the week he spent explaining to Michael what he was doing, but it made the work better. He couldn’t help but liken it to a programmer explaining to a rubber duck what was wrong, and finding the problem. 

It was utterly domestic, but it worked for them. Gavin was able to gather the finalized information that he needed, and organized a meeting with the rest of the crew to brief them on their roles. 

This would be the first time he met the rest of the crew, and even though he knew the majority of them, there were still at least one more member that he hadn’t met. Nerves kept him awake the night before the meeting, and he was running off three cups of coffee when Michael and him arrived at 9 am. 

Geoff led him into the room with the table and maps, and he connected his laptop to a projector. He was left alone in the room for a while to set up, and prepare himself while Michael and Geoff talked in the kitchen. 

After setting up the laptop and preparing the information, which he had organized in slides the previous night while unable to sleep. He went through the slides for a third time in the last hour to make sure they were accurate, fixing a few more spelling mistake he found while reading through. 

At some point, Jack wandered into the room, sipping her coffee slowly, and looking him over. “How are you doing?” She asked, calculated. Gavin turned, and shrugged, In the short time he knew Jack, he knew that there was no point in lying to her, not when she was able to read people so easily. 

“Nervous, obviously. I know the plan will work, as long as everyone knows their roles, and follows them, but on heists like this..” He trailed off, both he and Jack both knowing the end to that sentence. They both had been in this line of work long enough to know the risks. 

Their silence was broken by a new person entering the room. Gavin didn’t recognize him, but Jack did, if the friendly smile on her face and tip of her coffee towards him said anything. “Hey, Lil J.” She greeted him, while Gavin just tried to make himself invisible in the other corner of the room. It didn’t seem like he was noticed yet, so he just observed their ensuing conversation, Jack seeming open and kind as always, but this newcomer met her in the middle, cheery and seemingly pleased to be here. 

Gavin wasn’t able to watch for long, as Jack looked back towards him, and ushered him forward. “This is Gavin, he organized the job we’re planning today.” Jack introduced him to the other, who smiled widely at him. He couldn’t help but be thankful that she didn’t mention they were tracking him down a few weeks previous. 

“Good to meet you, I’m Jeremy.” Gavin nodded, and they shook hands. They made small conversation between the three of them, and he learned that Jeremy wasn’t officially part of the crew, but had come in to replace someone who had recently left. Gavin had questions about that, but didn’t get a chance to ask them when Geoff came in, Michael and the Vagabond in conversation and trailing after him. 

The nerves appeared again, but Gavin didn’t have time to focus on that. Geoff waited until everyone had taken a seat, and then looked to Gavin to start. He only hesitated a moment longer than he had to, then slipped into his work. 

The presentation was easy once he slipped into the persona that he had built up for so long. Confident, intelligent, and a little arrogant, but enough to convince the people around him that he was right, to follow him. The persona was who he imagined the Golden Boy would be, if he was real. 

Gavin took a moment while pointing out the blueprint of the bank to glance at Geoff, who was nodding along, and looking mildly pleased. It gave him a small boost of confidence, and surveying the rest of the room, it did seem like everyone else was interested, if not excited. 

The explanation finished up with Gavin explaining the different jobs that each person would have. It was a little difficult to figure out the jobs for everyone since he didn’t know what they actually do in their usual heists, but everyone seemed relatively pleased with it. 

“I’ll be on your in-ears the entire heist, and can take any questions, but we have to get this done quickly.” Gavin finished off, turning to look at the table in front of him. They didn’t seem to have any questions, so he turned to Geoff, opening his hands in a finite movement. 

Geoff stood up, and dismissed the rest of the room. They all seemed excited to get ready, conversation immediately breaking out after the silence, connecting to each other and making plans to begin work on the heist immediately. 

Geoff broke off from the rest of them and came over to Gavin. He tensed up, the Golden Boy persona breaking as the intimidating presence came closer, but Geoff seemed pleased. He clapped Gavin on the shoulder, giving him a smile. “You shone up there.” He said simply, and then let his hand slip off, heading to where Jack stood by the door, smiling at the pair of them. They slipped out the door, and the only three people left in the room were Michael, Jeremy and himself. The Vagabond had disappeared somewhere while Geoff had been talking to him, likely to stock up on the various weapons required for the heist. 

“Let’s go boy, Jeremy and I have stuff to get done, and you have to ride along.” Michael waved him over, and lead him out the door. He quickly grabbed his laptop on the way out, and Jeremy followed them through the apartment to Michael’s car. 

Gavin ran ahead and jumped into the front seat before it could be taken from him. That’s been his spot this whole time. Jeremy didn’t complain however, sliding into the back and pulling out his phone, starting to make a call. 

“We have to meet my contact for my explosives shit, I gotta stock up.” Michael explained as they began driving out of town. Gavin was excited to be working this closely on the heist, for the first time he would be able to see it through start to finish, with a crew that knew what they were doing.

It was going to go perfect, he knew it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hello everyone! i realize this update is pretty late in the day, sorry about that. i feel like i owe an explanation for why it's been like 7:00 est when usually i update around noon, so here is that:   
> i live in ontario, and am currently in college, but the teachers are on strike. usually, i would upload in my lunch break, or immediately when i got back to my dorm at like 4, but since they're on strike, i'm at home, and i go into my old drama class (since i'm doing something related to drama in college), and stick around for their rehearsals, which go until about 5:30. so there it is, thats why the chapters are late.   
> hope it's not too big of a deal? in apology, this chapter is like 2,000 words so please enjoy!! I think we're getting pretty close to the end, but i have some idea's for oneshots.


	17. Chapter 17

The meeting between Michael and Jeremy’s contact was quick, and it was obvious they worked together a lot, if the friendly banter between the three was anything to go off. Gavin stood to the side and watched the interaction, and didn’t miss the glances that were sent at him by the contact. Michael didn’t move to introduce them, so the contact didn’t ask.

He had a box of chemicals shoved into his arms as Michael grabbed them, and instructed to put them in the car. As he was storing them, Jeremy was on another phone call, which he tried not to listen in to, but he still caught a couple key terms, such as weapons, drugs and money. Which really could have been about anything, but once Michael finished with their contact here, he instructed him to another warehouse, saying a ‘Ray’ needed to meet with them. 

Michael seemed surprised, but agreed, since they were ‘already on the right side of town.’ He drove the group of them a little further out into the desert, pulling up to an older looking warehouse. A younger guy was waiting outside the warehouse for them, scuffing his boot in the sand. They pulled to a stop in front of him, as he cracked a smile and waved at them. 

“Hey Michael.” He said when they got out of the car, walking forward. He seemed completely at ease, and so did Michael as they gave each other a quick hug, exchanging friendly pleasantries. “Who’s this?” He gestured towards Gavin, who nodded. 

“This is Gavin, Geoff’s got me watching him because of a few incidences. He’s planned this heist, so we’ll see how it goes.” Jeremy caught up with them from where he had stayed back in the car to finish another call with someone, but it didn’t seem like it was about business, so Gavin didn’t think they had anywhere else to go after this. 

“Hey, I’m Ray.” The guy stepped forward, and shook hands with Gavin, who felt the need to reintroduce himself, but didn’t. The guy in front of him didn’t seem too suspicious, or uneasy around any of them. He actually seemed open and friendly, which was unusual. “I used to work with Michael here.” Ray explained, seeming to know Gavin’s thought process. 

“He used to be the best fucking sniper I knew.” Michael piped up, glancing into the warehouse. “Used to. Now he runs our drug operation for us, didn’t want to be on the front lines anymore.” There wasn’t time to question what had happened, as Ray began instructing them on what he needed. Apparently a local gang had been invading on their territory, and he wanted to go to them, see if they couldn’t negotiate before starting anything. 

“Yeah, we’ll back you up.” Michael answered, gesturing between him and Jeremy, who nodded quickly. “I just need to find a place to hide Gav, he’s not great with fighting.”

“I want to help.” He piped up, and immediately regretted it when it seemed all air was sucked out of the desert as silence fell. His face felt hot, but he pushed through. “I don’t want to just hack, I can talk to people, I can be persuasive. I don’t want to be a waste of time.” The last part was squeezed out, nerves settling heavy on his chest as he talked.

He had shot a gun once, only once, when Dan dragged him out to a range. This was before he got his commands, but still was training himself to army standard, dreaming of the day he would be shipped across seas to stand in the line of fire. Dan had taken first shot, firing about three rounds until he put the safety on the gun, and stepped back. 

“Your turn, B.” He encouraged Gavin forward, his gangly arms that he hadn’t quite grown into yet reaching for the gun. When his fingers felt the metal of the gun underneath them, he felt a shock run through them, but pushed forward, picking up the small pistol, and aiming it down field. His breath was shaking, as were his hands as he clicked off the safety. 

As he tried to aim, his clammy palm slipped, and the gun went off with a loud noise, making him scream in shock as he let it go on the table again. 

The bullet ended up beside a target three over from where he had been trying to fire, and Dan took the gun from him, apologizing to the people who were staring at them with dirty looks. He hadn’t shot anything since that day. 

Yet, when Michael handed him a small pistol from his arsenal of weapons, he knew this was different. He would have been taught this eventually by someone, whether it be because he actually needed it, or asking for training, it would have happened. 

“Have you ever shot a gun before?” Jeremy asked, still sensing some apprehension from him. 

“Once, with my friend Dan.” He recounted a shortened version of the story, and say Ray exchange a glance with Michael. The pistol was taken away from him, replaced with a small knife, which he was told not to use unless absolutely necessary. 

“You’re just going to be there for more manpower. Just stand in the back, be quiet, and try to look tough. Don’t mention anything about this ‘Golden Boy’ shit, people don’t know we’re working with you yet, so we’ll try to keep your reputation separate.”

“Hang on, what the fuck?” Ray stepped forward, glancing at Gavin. “What’s this about ‘Golden Boy’?” Gavin tensed up, not wanting to reveal so much, but Jeremy seemed curious as well, looking at Gavin apprehensively. It seemed like he didn’t know either, so he just swallowed past the shame and tried to figure out the best way to explain, since it didn’t seem Michael was going to. 

“It’s a stupid nickname, but that’s me.” He left it simple, but that’s all that needed to be said. Ray immediately seemed more closed off, shifting his hold on his gun, in case he needed to use it soon. Gavin bit the inside of his lip to keep himself from protesting the movement. It made sense, his record in the past wasn’t totally spotless, but he didn’t think he deserved this kind of reaction. 

“Holy shit, really?” Jeremy spoke up, and Gavin turned to look, his eyes were wide with admiration. Gavin glanced back to Michael, who seemed to have no clue what was going on. “I had a friend work with you, way back, and I just.” Jeremy paused, breathing audibly a few times, slightly in shock. “It’s just so cool to meet you, to work with you!” 

“Uh.” Michael let out, and Jeremy seemed to remember where they were. 

“Right, sorry!” With that, he ran into the warehouse, where they were going to further discuss the plan of attack with Ray, who still seemed hesitant. 

“Let’s get this finished.” Ray said, turning towards the warehouse. “He stays out here.” He said, over his shoulder, and then entered the dark warehouse. Michael glanced back at Gavin, who just shrugged. He had never met Ray in his life before, he had no clue what this could be about. 

“Wait in the car.” Michael spoke first, and Gavin opened his mouth to complain, but the glare that was sent his way shut him up. He didn’t know why this was happening, he had no clue what Ray would be upset about, but now probably wasn’t the best time, especially since Ray was the one with a gun. 

Sitting in the front seat, he was able to see figures moving in the warehouse, but couldn’t actually see anything going on in there until Michael walked out, leading Ray and Jeremy. Ray got on the opposite side from Gavin, as far away as possible. None of them spoke, but they began driving back into the city, the quiet of the radio loud in the silence. 

Gavin wanted to speak up, but the tension shut him up. 

It was going to be a long drive.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> idk if i said i wasn't putting ray in this fic but he's here now lmao oops
> 
> context: ray was part of the fake ah crew since the beginning, but decided a few years after michael joined that he didn't wanna do heists as much anymore, and would rather run their drug empire for them, so he talked to geoff and that's his part of the fake ah crew thing now. he will still help on heists when he needs to, but won't go on the front lines, just if they need a sniper or whatever!! :)


	18. Chapter 18

They pulled up to another warehouse in the lower value part of the city, and Gavin felt himself tense. Ray turned in his seat to look at Gavin, then Jeremy, before starting to speak. “This is just going to be talking. You’re-” He pointed at Gavin, “Not getting a weapon. We can’t risk them not listening because they feel threatened. We’re also not gonna say shit about the whole ‘Golden Boy’ bullshit, got it?” Gavin nodded, not trusting his voice to stay even. 

Ray nodded, then got out of the car, tucking a pistol in his belt, and covering it with a purple sweater. Michael and Jeremy also concealed their weapons, and Gavin couldn’t help but feel a little left out, but he knew Michael would keep him safe if shit hit the fan. 

They got out of the car, and Gavin was still tense, but he let his sunglasses slip onto his face, and slipped into the persona of the ‘Golden Boy’, to keep himself from having a panic attack. He took a deep breath in, and felt himself slip away as they headed into the warehouse. He stood tall and found, calm and in control when the other dealer stood from the chair they were sitting on, only a few feet away. Behind them were at least ten other people, fully weaponized and ready to fire at a moment's notice. 

He didn’t flinch at the weapons this time, just stared down the leader with a cold glare from behind his glasses. It was easier to act tough behind a different persona. 

They approached the other gang leader with fake confidence, silent and careful. Ray was the first to speak up, walking ahead of the rest of them as they got closer. “You know why we’re here.” The words were calculated and careful. The leader nodded, not saying a word. Ray stopped a couple feet away from the group in front of them, the air around them tense. 

They were all silent for a couple more seconds, before Ray spoke up again. “This is my turf. You know this, your goons know this, the entire fucking city knows this.” The leader shifted, uncomfortable under the gaze of three of the more destructive members of the Fake AH Crew. 

“You were neglecting it.” 

“I was fucking busy keeping my ass, and the people who work for me safe. From what I’ve heard, your little band of idiots is struggling with that.” Ray paused, and Gavin looked over the small group of people behind the leader, who was very obviously uncomfortable at their presence. “If you’d like, I can let my people here deal with the rest of them too.” The threat came out calm, but Gavin saw both Michael and Jeremy tense at the words, ready to reach for their weapons at at moment. 

“You wouldn’t waste resources. We’ve heard of your recent failures, wasn’t it just a week ago that one of your warehouses burned to the ground?” The leader snarled, now standing and defending his territory like a feral animal. 

Gavin glanced at Michael’s back, where the wolf was growling. He swore he saw it nash its teeth, ready to lunge and wrap its teeth around the attacker's neck. 

“Did you also hear of the entire gang that was taken down in ten minutes by one of our guys? You have three here, take your odds.” Michael spoke for the first time, voice rough and demanding. The leader flinched instinctively. This was the first time that Michael had spoken, and it obviously took an effect on the people in front of them, as they started shifting nervously, and Gavin watched one of the back up’s share a glance with another, who seemed suddenly uncertain of their position. 

Gavin still didn’t speak however, just watching the confrontation going down in front of him. Ray seemed like he was waiting for an answer from the leader, who didn’t have one. He was grasping at straws, struggling to keep his composure. When it seemed like he wasn’t going to get an answer, Ray spoke up again, taking another step forward. One of the back up’s flinched at the movement. “What’ll you take?” He pressed, and the leader started pacing, worrying his hands.

The leader was quiet for long enough that Ray decided that he wasn’t going to speak and nodded. It seemed like confirmation enough for him. “You have a day to get out of here, and if you’re not gone, we will find you and burn your entire organization to the ground.” With that, he turned on his heel, and left, not looking back. Gavin watched them react for a moment, before following them. The leader had seemed to be in a state of panic, unsure what to do but not wanting to give up his small amount of control. 

There was nothing else that could be done for them, Gavin just hoped they listened. 

When they were all back in the car, no one else spoke. He shifted awkwardly in the silence, before speaking up. “So that went well, right?” 

“Gavin, you have something to do back at your apartment, and you’re not gonna leave for a while, okay?” Michael spoke first after another tense silence in which Ray and Michael exchanged glances. 

“What do you mean? Geoff hasn’t sent anything-”

“Gavin.” Michael shut him up quickly, punching the car into gear. “You have shit to do, somewhere that’s safe, while I’m busy cleaning this shit up.” Gavin went silent again, unsure exactly what Michael meant, but he knew it wasn’t good. Something had gone wrong during that interaction, and he wasn’t exactly sure what it was. 

He glanced over to Jeremy, who seemed to know what was going on. Maybe he could get some more information from him. Ray and Michael began talking about something else, speaking mostly in code about their plans, while Jeremy just sat in the back, nodding every now and then. Gavin leaned over to get his attention, and asked under his breath, “What happened?” 

Jeremy looked over at him, and seemed to debate for a moment before deciding to tell him. “It’s mostly reputation. If we just let these people walk, they might come back. We need to wipe them out, or at least most of them.”

“We’re going to get every one of those bastards.” Ray shot over his shoulder, before going back to planning with Michael. He seemed annoyed that Jeremy was telling Gavin this, but he didn’t have long to think before Michael was pulling into the parking garage by Geoff’s apartment. 

“I can’t watch you, and I don’t trust you not to follow us, so I’m walking you up to Geoff, and you two are just gonna sit here and twiddle your fucking thumbs for all I care, got it?” Michael demanded from the front seat, and Gavin wanted to protest, but he could see this wasn’t the time, and Michael would definitely not hesitate in dragging him up the stairs just to get him out of here. 

As it is, Michael refused to let Gavin walk himself up to the apartment, standing beside him in the elevator, and glaring at another man who tried to get in, before hitting the close doors button without letting him on. “Michael!” Gavin exclaimed, instantly feeling bad. 

“There’s other elevators, Gavin.” His voice pitched upwards in a mocking fashion as he level Gavin with the same glare, then went back to ignoring him as the elevator dinged with every floor.

When they did get to the elevator, Michael didn’t even explain to Geoff what was going on, just shoved Gavin towards the couch and left again. The two just looked at each other for a long moment, before Geoff went back to reading his book by the window. 

Gavin refused to feel awkward around him anymore, and strode over to the couch, pulling out his phone. It seemed like this apartment was a communal one, if Jack wondering out of one of the bedrooms in pyjama shorts proved anything. He didn’t miss the glance between her and Geoff, but didn’t bring it up. 

She probably just needed a nap and passed out, they’d obviously been friends for a very long time, and trusted each other. Gavin didn’t let himself think about longer than a passing thought, switching through different traffic cameras and security camera’s on his app, playing his personal game of ‘track the person’, trying to polish up his skills for the upcoming heist. 

He needed to be able to see from all angles, to watch everyone on the street and in the building when everything went down. At some point, Jack wondered behind him, holding a coffee close to her chest as she leaned over the back of the couch, watching him switch between camera’s, following a motorcyclist as they tore through downtown. 

She only spoke when the cyclist pulled into a house up in the hills, and got off, entering the house. “Why did you pick him?” She asked, sipping her coffee. 

“Seemed interesting. Sometimes they hit things and go flying, that’s always funny.” Jack raised her brows, but nodded. 

“I thought you weren’t too big on the whole death thing?” Geoff piped up from his chair, putting a bookmark in his novel and setting it down. 

“Well, it’s not like I see their insides. It’s like when you see it on Youtube, you’re not there, it’s just someone on a screen.” Gavin explained, unsure if he was making sense. Geoff didn’t question it, but Jack was curious about something else. 

“When did you make this software? I’m assuming you made it.” She moved around the couch to sit properly beside him, pulling her legs up to cross them. 

“A few years ago, I was maybe 19?” Jack waved her hand to prompt him to continue, to explain why he did it. “I had a lot of time on my hands.” He said simply, not wanting to reveal much more. It was around the time Dan left, and a month after he finished it, he got his last letter from him, followed by radio silence. 

Jack didn’t press further, instead asking him to explain how he made the program, nodding along to reassure him that she was listening. It felt familiar, like something a friend would sit and listen to you for hours, and Gavin felt at home for the first time in a while, with Geoff sitting in the corner, nose buried in a book, Jack warm at his side, smiling and sipping her coffee every so often. It was safe.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm back at college now but holy shit I'm busy so I might have to take like one week off just to build up a stock of chapters, but maybe not, I have until chapter 20 rn so it'll be at least two weeks of consistent posting before the potential of a lull


	19. Chapter 19

When Michael stormed into the apartment a few hours later to collect Gavin, he paused in the doorway at the sight in front of him. Sometime over the day, the Vagabond had made his way to the apartment, and now sat on the floor in front of Gavin, who was yelling about something on the screen as Jack burst into laughter next to him. 

Gavin only cast Michael a glance when he came in, before protesting loudly when the Vagabond killed his character on the screen, making Jack laugh again. Geoff was looking over the group from behind his book, watching the screen with a sly grin. 

Jeremy came in behind him, locking his phone as he stepped into the room. He took a moment to take in the scene as well, before joining the rest of the crew on the couch, picking a controller from pile by the tv and waiting to join whatever game they were playing. 

Gavin lost focus of what else what happening when his character was killed again, but he managed to drag Jack’s character with him, as the other yelled in betrayal. When he looked back over, Michael had moved to the window, staring at the city below. It didn’t seem like he way paying the rest of them any mind, so Gavin left him be for now. 

They played far into the night, sipping beer and talking back and forth. Knowing of the coming heist in the morning left them all too excited to sleep, but eventually the night wore down, as they split into smaller groups, talking among themselves about past heists. Gavin approached the window where Michael was still standing, handing him a beer. 

“No, thanks though.” Gavin didn’t comment on the choice, and set the beer on the table near them, sipping his own. They were quiet for a while, just looking out across the city, listening to the quiet hum of conversation. 

“Can you really not shoot?” Michael spoke up, sounding amused. “Like, at all?” 

“I never said that!” Gavin gaped at him, while Michael just looked at him, not really believing it. “I went to a range once.” He frowned, closing his mouth when Michael started laughing. 

“Once?” Michael said through his laughter, which grabbed the attention of the Vagabond, who was standing nearby with Jack. He turned to the two of them, and somehow his dark mask conveyed that of confusion. “I hardly think that qualifies you to hold a gun outside of a range, under heavy supervision.”

“Michael!” He yelled, his face heating up when Jack turned to look as well. He didn’t like his weaknesses being held out in front of everyone else. “When you’re a hacker, it’s not like you really need to know how to shoot, you’re not going to shoot a computer to unlock it.” He pointed out, and heard the Vagabond snort. 

“Works if you want the information gone.” 

“But what if it’s on the cloud? You have to get in for just a bit to ensure you’re getting all the information you need.” The Vagabond scoffed at his response, but didn’t argue the point until Jack spoke up.

“What if someone walks in on you, and you get caught? What are you going to do then?” She questioned, genuinely interested. 

“Well… I’ve always been pretty fast.” She didn’t look too impressed with that answer, seeming more amused than annoyed. “Anyway, most of the time I connect remotely, so it doesn’t matter anyway.” 

“There’s so many situations where you’ll have to be hands on though, what if you can’t connect remotely without being detected?” 

“In what situation would I be able to physically be in the office, where I couldn’t remotely connect at same time?” 

“In a situation where you’d have to kill the person on the computer.” The Vagabond deadpanned, and Gavin didn’t know how to reply to that. He hadn’t really considered the possibility of actually having to kill anyone. He didn’t like thinking about that. 

When he didn’t answer, the Vagabond took that as a victory, and nodded. “We’ll take you to a range sometime after the heist, and properly teach you. If you’re gonna roll with us, you have to know how to protect yourself, at least.” He nodded once, and clapped Gavin on the shoulder as he walked by, heading to the other room, grabbing a diet coke on his way by the fridge. 

“You know, he didn’t used to wear the mask all the time.” Jack said, wistfully. Gavin turned to her, interested, but it didn’t seem like she was going to speak further on the comment, sipping her own beer and turning her back on them, heading to where Geoff and Jeremy were talking about a set of books that Jeremy had started reading recently. 

Gavin turned back to Michael, trying to see if he had any more information on what Jack had said, but it didn’t seem like either of them was interested in talking about that. He resigned himself to not knowing much more than this, and went back to drinking his beer. At one point, Geoff kicked them out of his apartment, telling them all to get some rest, and be back at three the following day for the final briefing before the heist began. 

Michael drove the two of them home, the last to leave the car park, waving at Jeremy as he got into his own eyesore of a car, as the Vagabond went by on a motorcycle. Gavin felt his nerves start to set in. If something went wrong tomorrow, this would be the last time he saw everyone happy, and together. All that would be on him. 

As if he heard his thoughts, Michael spoke up. “You’ve gone over the plans for tomorrow?” 

“Not yet, I was planning on doing that when we got back. It shouldn’t take me too long, just gonna check over the security camera footage and make sure it’s all going according to my schedule, and they haven’t changed it too much, I shouldn’t have to watch more than one cycle to ensure that they’re still going by my schedule.” Gavin rubbed his eyes, glancing at the clock on the dashboard. 

It was already a little past 1 am, and the next shift wasn’t until 3. Gavin let out a heavy sigh and resigned himself to a long night. He had forgotten his plans while talking with Jack about his favourite game, and then she told him Geoff owned pretty much every game available for the Xbox, and then it was hours later. 

Michael glanced over at him, eyes lingering on his own, likely noticing the deep bags and how bloodshot they were. “Why don’t you just head to bed? You explained what you were doing, I don’t mind staying up a little longer and watching.” 

Gavin shook his head, he couldn’t leave that responsibility to Michael, and if something went wrong, he would be crushed by the guilt. This was his job, it’s what he signed up for when he started this line of work. 

So, he found himself downing another coffee and shaking the sleep off. He really didn’t need to check, the guards switched at the right time, and it seemed like they had been the whole day, if looking at the past security tapes was anything to go by. Michael had gone to his own apartment, and Gavin felt terribly, and utterly alone in his silent apartment.

The nerves were really creeping up on him now, threatening to keep him up all night, even though he knew that he needed sleep to be able to concentrate during the heist the following day. Once they did their shift change, Gavin switched his computer off, and grabbed his phone, heading to his bedroom immediately. 

Pulling the blankets up to his chin, he plugged his phone into the charger, waiting until it lit up to tell him it was charging. When it did, he saw he had a text from Michael. 

[2:13 AM Michael: Goodnight boi] 

It was next to nothing, but it somehow soothed his nerves a bit. It didn’t seem that Michael was nervous, or worried about the following day, which gave Gavin a little more confidence in his plans. 

The plan would work, it had to.


	20. Chapter 20

The next morning was groggy, but Gavin knew he had to get up, to ensure everything was still ready. When Michael came to get him at noon, he’d already been up for a few hours, making final notes and surveying the cameras. He brought with him a coffee and muffins, forcing Gavin to eat one before they left for Geoff’s apartment. He was still nervous, his leg bouncing with energy that he didn’t know he had. 

When they got there, it seemed like everyone else was already there, even though they had agreed to meet at 3, and it was just barely 2:30. When they got in, Michael sent Gavin towards the meeting room, while he split to grab a set of chemicals that he had decided that he needed a few days before, promising to be there in just a couple minutes.

When Gavin walked into the room, Geoff sent him a wide smile immediately. He was confident, so sure that this was all going to work, and Gavin couldn’t help but latch onto that, and use it as his own confidence. He set his shoulders back, slowly and after Geoff had looked away. 

He took a second, closing his eyes and breathing deep. He had to believe in the plan himself if it was going to work, if he didn’t believe in it then something was bound to go wrong. 

When Gavin opened his eyes again, the Vagabond was staring at him. He didn’t know what to think of this, but just broke eye contact, shaking his head. He just sat at the table, waiting for Michael to return before starting. Geoff seemed to want to start soon, as his leg bouncing up and down. 

Michael arrived only a couple minutes later, and Geoff lept up, stepping in front of the map with a large grin on his face. The room fell silent within seconds, and Gavin tapped his fingers on the table, trying to contain his nerves into that small movement. 

“Alright! Welcome back, everyone.” Gavin saw Michael crack a smile from the chair beside him. “You already know the plan, but I figured we’d just run through it once last time before heading out, I hope you all set up what you need already, because we don’t have time.” Everyone nodded, and Geoff clapped his hands together in satisfaction. 

“Perfect, so, to review, Michael and Vagabond, you guys are our strike team, you’re going to go in through the back, try to be quiet, and get to the vault. Gavin will be watching on the cameras, and ensuring that the guard on camera’s can’t see your movement. Jeremy, you and I are on outside cover, and Jack, as always, you’re our driver.” Geoff turned to look at each of them as he mentioned their job. 

They seemed ready, but Geoff motioned for Gavin to explain the blueprints one last time. As he was going through it, the energy in the room became excited more than nervous. The group in front of him was competent, and confident in their abilities, and Gavin knew this would work. 

It had to work. 

The meeting finished with Geoff saying a few small words of confidence, that sparked inspiration into all of them. 

“Don’t fuck this up, boys.” With that, they separated, and Gavin was left in the room with Geoff, who guided him to another room with another computer with several monitors. He had fifteen minutes to connect to the security camera’s, but he knew he could do it in five. 

Then, he was alone, left to the work. He stormed through the steps and was soon watching as the security guards anxiously checked their watches, ready to clock out after a long day. Gavin put on his in-ears and listened to the crew talking quietly. He knew they were almost there, and turned to the monitor with a street view. He was going to have to loop a safe cycle for the few minutes it took them to approach, and leave the bank.

Thankfully, he had recorded that clip a couple days previous, and was ready for whenever they came into view. “Remember to let me know when you guys are getting close.” Gavin reminded them, and Michael gave a quick word of confirmation. They were all silent for a couple seconds, then Jeremy spoke up. 

“Cover team is heading in.” Gavin hit a button, and on another screen it showed the modified footage, while the live feed was still available, but only to him. 

“You’re clear.” He replied, easy and confident. He was fine with this kind of work, he could do this shit on a regular basis. Turning back to the security guards, he watched them do their final loop of their area, time ticking down. 

“Strike team is in place.” The Vagabond spoke up next, and Gavin hummed to himself. 

“I will signal you.” He breathed, feeling as though he was being watched as one of the security guards looked up at the camera. The feeling stayed even when the guard turned away and continued on his route, but he tried to ignore it, waiting until they returned to their original post for just a couple seconds, then began to leave. 

“Go.” He signaled, and saw the door creak open, revealing the Vagabond, who had to shake his lockpick loose, followed by Michael, who cradled a bag as they slide through the door, closing it soundly behind him. He chuckled to himself when he noticed that Michael’s mask was plastered in stickers from various vacation places. He thought to comment on it, but resigned to bringing it up later. 

“We’re in.” Michael whispered, and Geoff spoke up.

“Clear so far on the road, how’s our getaway vehicle looking?” There was silence for a second before Jack replied. 

“All good here, I’m pulled over on the side out front of the bank. Engines still running.” Gavin kept a close on the guards as the new set began to head out to their posts. Michael and the Vagabond were right on schedule. 

They had about three minutes to blow the door open and get the cash before the guards were on them, but Gavin would do everything he could to elongate that. He made loops of the hallways, and covered Michael and the Vagabond’s entrance and movement along the hallway, much as he did with the road. 

His hands were shaking a bit as he watched Michael begin to place bombs around the door. As skilled as the Vagabond was at lockpicking, they agreed this would be easier. 

“Gavin, what are we at timewise?” The Vagabond checked in, and Gavin glanced towards the guards, two of which had stopped to talk to each other. 

“Three minutes, maybe more. They’re faffing about, but as soon as that door blows, they know you’re here.” He saw the Vagabond adjust his gun that was slung across his chest, and nod to himself. 

“Alright, I’m blowing it.” Michael stated, he and the Vagabond moving around a corner. 

Counting it down, Gavin’s eyes shifted towards another screen when he saw movement. 

There was a straggling guard rounding the corner to the hallway Michael and the Vagabond had snuck into. As Michael activated the explosion, Gavin yelled through his in-ear. 

“Michael!” 

And all hell broke loose.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WE OUT HERE BOIS


	21. Chapter 21

“Michael!” Gavin screamed through the in-ears, likely deafening everyone else connected, if the complaints by Jeremy were anything to go by, but they quickly stopped when they heard Michael curse, then a scuffle. “Michael, there’s a guy-”

“I fucking know, Gavin!” Michael yelled back, and he watched on the camera as Michael twisted to grab his gun, but the security guard was quickly gaining on them in a few seconds it took for the Vagabond to readjust his grip on his gun. 

The guard called for backup, and Gavin swore over the headset, trying to find anyway to delay the guards, but it wasn’t like there was a large metal door he could slam shut, all he could do was inform the rest of them that guards were on the way. 

“You still have about a minute if you just-” He took a second to breathe, hands now shaking again. “Just deal with this guy, I’m doing everything I can to cut off outside communication.” He quickly began to try to overwhelm the phone lines, pulling up a bot to call the bank, and every time they answered another bot start calling. He knew there were cellphones in the building, but he had no control over that, not this far away. All he could hope was that the Vagabond would keep the guards busy enough that they wouldn’t have time to call the authorities, and it seemed like it was working for now. 

“How are we looking, Lil J?” Michael asked, as Gavin watched him shove money into the bag at his side, the Vagabond mowing down guards as they rounded the corner. 

“A cop just drove by, but so far, nothing.” It seemed he had spoke too soon, as soon as the words left his mouth, Gavin could hear the alarm over the in-ears, and the Vagabond swore. 

“Alarm was tripped by one of the guards before I could get him, we have to go.” He said, and laid one last guard out, before turning and grabbing his own bag, which Michael had thrown a few fistfuls of cash into, lugging it over his shoulder, gesturing for Michael to follow him. 

The two made their way towards the front of the bank, directing Jack to have the Roosevelt ready to go. Gavin watched with bated breath as they busted through to the front of the bank, the Vagabond instantly opening fire above the heads of patrons, who were already confused by the constant ringing phones. The scene burst into chaos as people fell to the ground from fear, and Gavin could hear screaming. 

His mind tried to send him back to that office building, just weeks previous, but he didn’t let it, not now, he didn’t have time to lose himself in memories. “We got heat.” Geoff’s voice broke through the noise that echoed in his mind, and he went back to focusing on the heist at hand, hearing Jack swear. He turned to the camera that showed the outside of the bank as Michael and the Vagabond ran through the glass doors, wrenching open the Roosevelt door and getting inside quickly. 

“Drive, we got this!” Jeremy said, and the Roosevelt tore out of the parking lot just as cops arrived. As it moved, Gavin saw Michael and the Vagabond lean out of the windows, shooting back at the cops, who began to follow. It was mere seconds later when Gavin watched Jeremy and Geoff blast out of the alley, following after the cops, who chased Jack. 

Gavin had nothing else he could do but watch as Jack swerved through the streets, leading them further down town. Jeremy managed to run one of the cops off the road, a few stray bullets ricocheting off his armored car. 

Gavin listened over the police radio, as the police tried to figure out their next move. He heard the crew’s name thrown around like the name of an old friend, comfortable and right where it was supposed to be. 

This is where they were supposed to be. 

As Jack eventually lost the cops, Michael’s loud laughter came over the in-ears, as well as Geoff giving directions to the nearest safe house of theirs, congratulating all of them on a heist well done, and everything felt perfect. 

Gavin would have to hang around the apartment by himself for a little while until the heat was fully off of them, but he didn’t mind, just following the Roosevelt as it tore through downtown towards a parking garage that they had stored another car. When Gavin had asked why they didn’t just use another unrecognizable car originally, he hadn’t really been given an answer, just yelled at and insulted a few times before he gave up the question. 

He smiled at the memory as he wandered out of the room, and went to the kitchen, grabbing an apple. He had a while until the rest of the crew would return to town, and relished in the small feeling of freedom he had. While it was nice having Michael around, he did miss being by himself. 

It only took him about a half hour to get bored of walking around the apartment. It seemed dead with none of the crew in the same room, so he left. It wasn’t that far from his own apartment, and if he got tired, he could get a taxi. Before he left, he grabbed a switchblade that the Vagabond had left on the counter, a small bit of anxiety spiking when he thought of getting lost in the city. He didn’t have anyone to call at that point. 

Shaking it off, he left the building, and started his walk home. He could still hear sirens in the distance as the police tried to find the crew, but at this point, they were long gone, probably having bevs on a deck or something like that. Gavin smiled at the thought, pulling out his phone. No messages. 

It was about ten minutes before Gavin noticed the person that seemed to be following him. His skin began to crawl as he sped up his pace, and he felt the switchblade that he had tucked into his belt burning his skin as he walked. 

The person wasn’t able to be shaken, no matter how quickly he walked, but he was getting close to his apartment, but no, he couldn’t just bring this guy to his home, that would be insane. He did a quick recalibration in his mind, rushing to try and figure out a safe place. Damn it, he really should have focused on his own neighborhood when watching on the security cameras. 

Gavin finally came up with a destination in his mind, the pizza shop that he had first seen the crew from. It was open once again, although the brick still showed remains of the charring. 

He only hoped that young girl had quit, maybe moved away to a safer city. The walk was about ten minutes longer than it should have been, but the person behind him still was on his tail, and seeming to get closer. It took everything in him not to break into a run, but he knew if he did, he was fucked. 

It seemed that was his destiny anyway, as another figure appeared from around a corner, menacing and huge in the night. Gavin had no chance in a fight against this guy. 

He tried to cross the street, but the figure followed. Of course, the street was deserted for the first time in probably months, because that’s just how Gavin’s luck ran. Sucking in a huge break of air, he bolted. The pizza shop was in sight, its red, glowing sign a beacon in this dark. But would it even matter if he got a public place? The last time he went to this shop, it was pretty much abandoned, and that was much earlier in the day. 

He only got a few paces ahead before his arm was grabbed, and he was pulled flush against the figure’s chest, wrestled into the alley where they had appeared. He squirmed and yelling, actually managing to wrangle out for a couple seconds, before the stalker was upon him and grabbed his arm around his back, and trapped them in a zip tie in one fluid motion. 

Well, that wasn’t great. 

He continued twisting, but when he felt a cool metal at his throat, he stopped. “You’ve gotten a pretty penny on your head, Goldie.” He heard the figure say from behind him, and a chill ran up his spin. The voice was slimy, and Gavin couldn’t help as his body contorted away from the touch at his wrist. 

“Let me go!” He shouted, his voice rushing from his mouth with no prompting from his mind. Thus far, most of his yells had been wordless panic, adrenaline rushing through him. The figure just laughed, and gestured for the person now clutching his zip tied wrist to move him to the car sitting in the alley. “They’ll find me!” He yelled, the threat clear in his voice, and the figure did stop, but only to walk towards him and lean in his face. 

“Your friends aren’t in town right now, are they? They aren’t gonna know shit until you’re long gone.” Gavin nearly gagged on the breath wafted in his face. It smelled like cigarettes and years of poor dental hygiene. 

The worst part was that the figure wasn’t wrong. He was utterly, and totally alone in this big city.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys!! I have placement tomorrow so you get the chapter a day earlier!! Hope you enjoyed the heist ;)


	22. Chapter 22

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WARNING FOR GRAPHIC (?) VIOLENCE if you dont like blood or stuff, might wanna skip this chapter.

Gavin was thrown into the back seat of this car unceremoniously, and driven through the city. He tried to remember the streets, but he was still new to the city, and the car was going much faster than he could read the street signs. At one point, he had tried to kick the window out, but the person sitting in the passenger seat in front of him wordless turned and trained a gun on him. 

That had stilled him pretty quickly. 

His phone and the switchblade both burned in his pocket. His only leg up on the two was that they hadn’t shaken him down, or checked for any weapons. He just had to get himself into a position where they couldn’t see him wriggle the blade out of his belt and start hacking at the zip ties. 

It didn’t seem like he’d get that opportunity, however, as they were pulling into the driveway of a shitty, broken down house on the outskirts of the city. The two in the front seats got out first, and then pulled Gavin out of the backseats by his feet. His knees hit the ground with a bone crunching noise, rocks embedding themselves in the skin as he went down. “Get up.” The person commended, and when he didn’t move for a second, he was yanked up by the zipties. 

Gavin yelled in pain, but the pulls continued, harsh and unforgiving. His wrists already felt like they were bleeding. He was pulled into the garage of the house, and thrown on the concrete ground. It was dark, and the only light he saw was a single lamp on a table. The light bounced off the metal instruments sitting on the table, and Gavin’s heart stopped. 

“Now, there is someone who's gonna pay us the big bucks for you, but they didn’t say anything about keeping you in good shape, so we’re gonna get as much info out of you as we can.” The person walked over to the table, running his hand over the instruments. 

As this was happening, the second person had wrestled him into a shitty plastic lawn chair with unrecognizable stains. Gavin could take a guess at what it was, but the thought made his stomach turn. He stayed silent, staring at the knives on the table, still focusing on the objects tucked in his pocket and belt, both of which were behind his back and between the chair at this point. 

The second person retreated into the shadows of the room, and the main person finally selected a knife, holding it in front of him and pricking his finger on the blade. Blood instantly bubbled up. 

“Now, you can tell me everything you know now, or we can have some fun.” The person’s voice dropped low on the last few words, and Gavin’s entire body tensed up. “Honestly, I’d prefer if you keep up this silence act for now, but when I break this bad boy out, you can scream as loud as you want. No one is going to hear you.” He didn’t like that this guy seemed to be getting off on the thought of hurting him. 

Gavin didn’t say anything. He wasn’t a complete idiot, he knew that the Fake AH Crew could do a hell of a lot worse to him than these two schmucks. It didn’t actually matter if he was going to talk anyway, because the person was already approaching before he could even think of replying. 

“Perfect, I was hoping you were gonna say that.” The person seemed pleased with their self, and brought the knife close to the flesh of his arm. They seemed to slowly move the knife closer, and then in one quick movement, slashed it across his arm. The blood flowed quickly, and Gavin couldn’t help the yelp of pain that escaped him. 

The figure laughed, turning to the second person in the room. “Oh, this is going to be great if that's your pain limit.” They turned back and quickly slashed across his cheek. Gavin felt tears spring to his eyes, the salty water quickly mixing with his blood and making it sting more. 

“Please, just let me go, I don’t know anything.” He uttered, and the person knelt to his level, keeping the knife very much in view. 

“Oh trust me, we’ll let you go. But I think you want to stay here a little longer, I don’t know what you did to piss of the people who put this bounty on you, but I can tell they have a lot bigger plans for you when we’re done here.” With their final word, they dug the knife into Gavin’s thigh and pulled.

Gavin screamed, entire body contorting, trying to get away from the knife and only succeeding in knocking himself backwards. His head hit the concrete floor, and the next thing he remembered was being doused in freezing water. 

“Can’t have you leaving me just yet, huh boy?” 

There was something about that statement, the way it was said that made Gavin shake. He couldn’t put his finger on it, his head buzzing. 

The rest of Gavin’s night continued in the same fashion, the knife cutting into his skin in quick succession, tearing through jean and the fabric of his shirt as he went. At one point, the person had cut hair from his scalp, mocking him with his moniker as he did so. 

“Not so fucking Golden now, are you?” The person asked, and spit on his, tossing the knife back on the table. “I’m bored, by the time I get back, you better have answers.” With that, the two left the room, leaving Gavin sitting in the middle, arms zip tied behind his back, and covered from head to toe in cuts. 

His voice was sore from yelling, and his head woozy. Surely, a small nap wouldn’t hurt. He could wake up and figure his way out of this in the morning. He was just so tired, and really, what was he going to do if he did get out? Nothing to do but sleep on it, really.


	23. Chapter 23

When Gavin next came to, he felt like he was frozen, his body sticky and shaking against the cool concrete floor. It was still dark, but he needed to move. He tried moving his arms, and yep, still tied, but the chair skidded away from him. 

Which wasn’t great, it made a fair bit of noise, but no one busted down the door at the sound, so he counted it as a success. Alright, next step, find a way to get the zip ties off. He tried all the tactics he had seen online to free yourself from zip ties, but they didn’t seem to work. A small buzz from his pocket reminded him of his advantage that he had on the situation, and he tried to maneuver his hands to reach the switchblade in his belt. 

He managed to get a grip on it after a few minutes of trying, and began hacking at the zip ties as much as he could. He nicked his wrists a few times in the process, but given all the other superficial wounds on his body, this wouldn’t matter too much. As he worked at them, he began to hear voices on the other side of the garage door. He was so close now, if he pulled hard enough he might be able to break it. 

Gavin didn’t get the chance to test that theory when the door opened, revealing the same man from the previous night. A grin spread across his face when he saw Gavin on the floor, chair skidded away. “Restless?” He asked, and grabbed him by the shoulder, picking him up with a single hand and forcing him back on the chair. “Don’t worry, we’ll be on the move soon. Your bounty is about to be paid, friend.” 

The use of the word friend felt slimy, and cold. Part of him wanted to growl ‘I’m not your friend’ childishly, but he refrained, hand frozen on the switchblade, plan running through his mind quickly. The thought made him sick to his stomach, but it was the only way out of this situation. 

He pulled, and the zipties snapped. He had seconds to be on his feet and upon the man before he was tackled to the ground again. 

Gavin jumped towards the man, but he wasn’t fast enough, and was clotheslined to the ground, coughing. “What the fuck?” The guy said, approaching Gavin, but he swung out and caught his leg with his blade. He went down, as Gavin continued to try to catch his breath, but he didn’t have much time before the guy rolled on top of him, trying to wretch the knife out of his hands. 

He had no choice. He plunged the knife forward with a desperate yell, and felt it make contact. The guy paused, eyes going wide, and looked down at his chest, where the switchblade was embedded firmly. Gavin twisted it, and he let out a gurgle after a scream of pain. 

The smell of blood hung heavy over the pair as Gavin pushed the man off him, and as his body moved, the blade came out with a wet noise. 

Gavin vomited. 

When he was able to focus on anything else, he glanced back towards the guy, who was gasping for breath, and trying to hold the gap in his chest, blood seeping through his fingers. It took everything in Gavin not to puke again, but he managed to fight past the smell, and approached the guy, and held the switchblade close.

“Who is it?” He stated, and the guy just wheezed in response. It was obvious he wasn’t going to get more information from him, so Gavin left him there. He stood to his full height, wiping the knife on his already bloodied pants, and swallowed past the remaining bile in his throat. 

He glanced at the table full of instruments, and grabbed another knife just in case, and headed out, leaving stench of blood and pain behind. Gavin was lucky the door was unlocked, which was probably the only thing going right for him. In his mind, the words ‘golden record’ were playing on repeat, but he had to ignore it. It seemed the house was empty, but he couldn’t let his guard down. He peeked out the front window, maybe he would get lucky and there would be a car, but it seemed he had run out of luck at this point. 

He wouldn’t have been able to drive it very far anyway, Michael had been too busy to give him lessons. 

So, he opted for the backdoor, which opened to a forested hill. Gavin had no clue where he was, but he knew he had to get away from here. When his hands grabbed the screen door handle, blood stained the white metal, and he felt the bile rise back up. 

He needed to get out of this murder house. 

Gavin pushed, and suddenly a rush of clean air accosted him, and his head cleared, all but the words currently going in a loop. He didn’t take the time to smell the flowers, and broke into a run, bushes catching on his legs as he went. He was only able to run for a couple minutes until a burning pain in his leg became too much. He had somehow forgotten the stab wound on his thigh through the adrenaline of stabbing a guy, but the wound had finally protested loud enough for him to notice. 

He did a quick check to make sure he was still hidden, and sat down for a moment to check the cut. 

It was deep, and stung when he felt the skin around it, so he assumed it was likely infected at this point, which, just great, that’s what he needed right now. There was not much else he could do, so he tore a bit of fabric from his shirt to wrap around his thigh. He knew it was mostly for if the wound was still bleeding, but figured it would keep out any other dirt. 

Unfortunately, that didn’t magically fix him like video games could have led him to think. He cursed all the zombie survival games he had played in his mind as he struggled to stand, the pain too great for his leg to take his weight, and went back down. 

He felt his pocket buzz again, and pulled out his phone the fastest he ever had before. Someone up there must be watching him, or the guys that captured him were completely empty-headed, but he wasn’t going to complain. 

His phone was down to 15 percent, which meant he didn’t have much time. Gavin quickly called Michael, trying to keep his voice from shaking. 

“Where the fuck are you?” Michael answered immediately, his voice low and demanding. Gavin felt a small bit of fear at the amount of anger in his voice, but knew it was impossible for it to be directed towards him. 

“I don’t know, Michael, these guys jumped me and brought me to some house and then I think I killed a guy.” His voice broke, and there was silence on the other side as Gavin breathed out, “I think I killed him…” He trailed off, staring into the forest. He could have sworn he saw movement, but it could just be his strained mind playing tricks on him. 

“Gavin, I need to you tell me where you-”

“I don’t know Michael, I ran into the forest, I can’t move, I can’t go-”

“Gavin, shut up. Just stay on the line, okay? Ryan’s trying to find you now, but it’s going to take a minute, but you can’t hang up, just try to tell me some landmarks anything.” 

The name confused Gavin for a moment, but he couldn’t focus on that right now, as he turned his head every which way. It was just trees for miles. “There’s nothing, but the house had a garage.” 

“Real fucking useful Gav.” Michael said, and Gavin could hear the smile, but it didn’t cheer him anymore. He heard a rustle, and there was definitely something in the forest with him. He fell silent, and tried to move into a more protected area, but left out a small gasp of pain when his thigh tensed. 

He heard conversation on the other side of the call, urgent and angry. He couldn’t pick out words, as Michael was talking over them. “Are you okay?” He finally caught, and refocused on the conversation, still eying the forest around him. 

“Michael, I think there’s someone here.” He breathed, staring into the trees. His back was against a thick tree, the bruises he had recently obtained numbly stinging against the bark. He shaking hands reached into his belt and grabbed one of his two blades, ready for another attacker to approach. 

“Is there anywhere nearby you can hide?” Michael questioned, and Gavin wanted to knock his head against a tree. 

“You really think I wouldn’t already be there if there was, Michael?” 

“Well, I don’t fucking know Gavin!” Michael yelled, and before he could respond, a yell broke through in the background of the call. “We’ll be there soon, just try to stay where you are, and keep your phone on, okay?” A twig snapped, and Gavin’s head whipped towards the source of the noise. He saw nothing. 

“Please hurry Michael, there was another guy, I don’t know where he is.” He whispered into the phone, and heard Michael start to say something, before he was cut off by silence. 

“Michael?” Gavin whispered, increasingly urgent. He pulled the phone away from his ear at the lack of response, and almost cried out with frustration. A black screen met him, and no matter how many times he tried to turn it on, the dark screen stayed the same. He threw the phone to the ground in frustration, and ran a hand through his hair, his free hand still clutching the knife, shaking. 

His knuckles caught on a chunk of dried blood sticking his hair together, and his stomach turned as his mind returned to the garage. He wondered if the guy was still there, gurgling and trying to hold his blood inside of him. 

Gavin didn’t realize he was pulling his hair until it began to hurt, and let go immediately. His hands were still shaking, though at this point he wasn’t sure if it was from fear, exhaustion, or frustration. 

There was another noise behind him, and Gavin froze, his back pressing against the bark of the tree as hard as he could, trying to become one with the forest. He heard heavy breath, then a very human swear, as the steps began to retreat. 

And the sound of a shot rang through the forest.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey friends!! A few updates down here, if you didn't notice, I posted a holiday special in this series that I've created, it isn't going to effect this story at all, but it is in this verse. Hope you enjoy it :)
> 
> Also, I've officially finished this story, it comes in at around 40,000 words, and I've already started the sequel, though I will be taking about a month break to catch up and create another backlog so that I can post on a schedule again. Hope you enjoy the final chapters here, and as always, feel free to comment and I try to respond to everyone!! I love talking to you guys and your love for this story makes me so so happy! Happy Holidays everyone


	24. Chapter 24

Gavin wanted to run, but he couldn’t get up. At the initial fire of a gun, he had tried to get to his feet, but had fallen back down, stifling a cry of pain with his hand. The stench of blood had suddenly crept into the forest after him, and he couldn’t help feeling like it was death itself hunting him down as he tried to creep through the forest unseen, crawling through the bed of leaves and dirt from tree to tree. 

There had been a thump after the shot, and then silence for far too long. When Gavin had glanced out from behind the tree, he had seen a figure laying facedown on the forest floor, and couldn’t look anymore. 

His movement was slow, painfully slow, in all uses of the word. His thigh sang as it scratched across the ground, small pebbles tearing at the fabric of his pants and the shirt he had wrapped around the wound. If it wasn’t infected before, it definitely was now. 

As Gavin reached an outcropping of rocks, he heard the sound of cars, and had to stop himself from crawling on his hands and knees onto the road. He still wasn’t sure who was in the forest with him, but it was unlikely at this point that the crew was there. His phone was long forgotten, likely broken on the forest floor. As his back leaned against the rocks, hoping this would work as hiding, another shot rang through the forest, and he had to clasp both hands around his mouth to stop the yell of fear from escaping him. 

The shot sounded far away, and it was possible it could have been a hunter, but his mind brought up the image of a figure lying dead still on the ground. 

His breathing was quick and shallow as he leaned against the rocks, straining his eyes to see through the trees, begging anything that would listen to see any member of the crew, someone to take him away from this hell. 

Gavin stayed where he was for what felt like far too long, but was probably only a few seconds, trying to make a plan, but coming up with nothing. He was stuck here, he couldn’t go so far without being lost in the forest. At least his phone had died somewhat nearby, so the crew had a general idea where he was. 

However, that meant that whoever was behind him also knew he was here. He only had a limited amount of time to get out of there, find a better hiding place, but he couldn’t go far. His mind raced, trying to come up with a plan but finding nothing. His ears were ringing in his mind and he couldn’t focus. 

He heard a crunch, and immediately knew he was out of time. Whipping around, he was faced with the barrel of a gun. He let out a loud yell, scrambling back as much as he can, swearing as he put weight on his wounded thigh. 

As Gavin went back, he tried to get a good look at this guy, but didn’t have enough time before another shot through the forest. Time seemed to go in slow motion as the guy began to turn, but wasn’t quick enough, a bullet catching him in the back of the skull and sending his body tumbling forward. 

On top of Gavin. 

He yelled again, trying to get this man off of him, struggling against the quickly cooling limbs of the body on him, bile rising in his throat again. All he could see was the shocked face of the man, as blood exploded from his forehead. 

He couldn’t escape, not with the burning in his thigh. He was too weak, too exhausted to shove the body off of him, and could feel the blood slowly seeping out of the gun wound onto his already bloodied shirt. There was nothing left in his stomach, or he would have vomited again. He could already taste it in his mouth. 

Gavin was now a sitting duck, under a dead body. Fantastic. 

He heard the sounds of running, and it sounded like a lot of people. Suddenly, there was more gunfire. He lay under the body, listening to the sounds of shots, fighting, and yells. The ringing in his ears was too distracting to make out any words, and his head was too foggy at this point to understand if he did. 

He did understand, however, when he saw Michael’s face come into view, haloed by the sun above. The edges of his vision were fading, and the last thing he saw was someone coming up behind Michael. He used the last bit of his energy to try and alert him, a small noise coming out of his throat, and then it was black. 

It was dark for a long time, a faint ringing in the back of his mind. At some point, he had been woken by someone, a light shined in his eyes, then nothing again for a while. Nothing got boring though, and the ringing began to get annoying. He struggled against the dark tendrils that seemed to grasp at him in his mind, eventually pulling out, and his eyes snapped open. 

Light flooded his vision, and he instantly closed them again. Where was he? 

Taking it slow this time, he tried to listen to the room around him first. It was silent, no heart monitor or anything. But he could hear the faint sound of breathing. He listened to it for a moment, the faint rise and fall of breath. It was slow and even, so he assumed that meant they were asleep. 

After another couple seconds, he took another shot at opening his eyes. It was slow going, but eventually he got them open, and took a small look around the room. It seemed he was back in Geoff’s apartment. 

He turned his head towards the direction of the breathing, and saw Michael, slouched over on himself as he slept. The light was from a window that was wide open, morning sun hitting him in the face. Poor choice in position, but the sleeping can’t complain, he reasoned. 

Not wanting to wake Michael, he began to take inventory. All his limbs were still intact, numb from lack of movement, but intact. His leg still faintly hurt, a soft throbbing every couple seconds, but not enough that it bothered him. His arms were still covered in bruises and cuts, but there wasn’t much to do about those, just wait. 

He felt like a thin layer of grim was laying over his skin, and couldn’t wait to get into a shower. His hair felt stiff, and a little sticky, and he tried not to think about what was making it feel like that. 

Gavin was only alone for a couple more minutes, until Jack walked in, wearing a long dress shirt and pyjama shorts. When she saw he was awake, she came to a stop, before rushing over and carefully pulling him into a hug. It was warm, and probably his first human interaction he was conscious for since he was captured. 

He still flinched away from it for a moment, before sinking into the hold. Jack wasn’t holding him against his will, just wrapping her arms gently around him, lightly enough he could move out of her grasp if need be. 

She let go after a couple seconds, and leaned back, looking him in the eye. “How are you feeling?” She asked, quiet, trying not to wake Michael as well. It seemed it was fairly early, and Jack was the only one awake. 

“Not great. What happened after I passed out?” He croaked out, voice broken from disuse. Jack gave him a small, worried look, but didn’t say anything yet, glancing back at Michael. 

“Why don’t we wait until everyone else wakes up. Are you hungry? Thirsty?” She grabbed a water bottle from beside his bed, holding it out. Gavin took it with a small nod of thanks, drinking the entire thing in less than a minute. It hurt going down at first, but quickly faded, becoming cool and refreshing. 

“Thanks Jack.” He said, putting the empty bottle on the small table beside him. She nodded, and held out an arm to help him get up if wanted to. He took the offer, and gingerly stood, legs still weak from the pain, but if he favoured his uninjured leg, he could move. 

“They got you pretty good, huh?” She murmured, helping him out of the room. They moved into the kitchen, and Gavin sat at one of the chairs, glancing at the leg. 

“Just a scratch, I’ll be fine.” Jack went about her business in the kitchen, pulling eggs out of the fridge, as well as a few other ingredients. 

“Well, we got you stitched up, so you’ll be fine now.” She paused, looking at the counter in front of her, thinking for a moment before speaking again. “Do you know who it was?” She glanced over at him as he shook his head. 

She swore quietly under her breath, continuing her work. They didn’t talk again for a little while, listening to the eggs sizzle on the pan. They heard movement from one of the rooms, and Geoff emerged, rubbing his eyes and looking exhausted. 

It was only when he was fully in the kitchen, and resting his chin on Jack’s shoulder that he seemed to realize someone else was present. He glanced over towards the table, where Gavin sat with a small smile, and didn’t move from where he was. “You good?” He asked simply, and nodded when Gavin confirmed that he was fine. 

They didn’t talk again, just listening to the pop of eggs on the pan, and just coming back into reality. Gavin’s leg wouldn’t let it forget the pain, but it was dull, and he could put it more towards the back of his mind. 

The three of them had breakfast, and were now sitting on the couch as Michael emerged from the room they had left him in. He seemed panicked, eyes wide and a gun in his hands. He looked around the room quickly, before eyes finally settling on Gavin, and only then he relaxed. 

Still, Michael never fully relaxed. “What are you doing out of bed? You’re going to fuck up your stitches, you idiot.” He snapped, striding over the couch. It almost seemed like he was going to drag Gavin back to bed by his ear, but he just leaned against the side at a single glance from Geoff. 

“He’s fine, Jack made breakfast, it’s in the kitchen.” He said simply, and Michael was on the move again, headed towards the kitchen. He returned with food, and sat on the floor in front of the coffee table. It made Gavin smile that one of the only rules that any of them obeyed was ‘no eating on the furniture.’

The day was groggy, and Gavin couldn’t remember too much of it when he woke up the next day, but it was nice to sit in quiet with everyone for a while. Eventually though, he did get too tired, and his leg began to hurt more, so Michael helped him back to the room. 

“Michael, why are you here?” Gavin breathed, eyes hazy and low. He was half asleep already, but focused enough to hear his answer as Michael sighed deeply, getting comfortable. 

“Because there’s not a second bed, doofus.” Michael replied with a smart ass smile, and Gavin wanted to huff and whine, but he hadn’t exactly been specific when he asked. 

“I mean, why don’t you go to another room? I know they have other beds.” He shot back, and Michael didn’t answer for a minute, looking anywhere but him when he tried to think of an answer. Gavin knew this game, he knew exactly why Michael wanted to stick around, he knew that he was scared of disappointing Geoff again by losing him. 

Part of him hoped he was proven wrong. 

Silence hung over the pair of them until Gavin dropped off into sleep. It was okay, he hadn’t really been expecting an answer anyway. 

His dreams were empty that night.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> wow i hope everyone's new year was nice mine was garbage


	25. Chapter 25

It was a little over a week before he was able to walk around without any sort of pain in his leg. Michael had finally been convinced to go home after three days of sleeping on a chair and complaining about back pain, but only if Gavin was under watch by both Geoff and Jack. He couldn’t help but feel a little bit of parental love for the two of them at this point. They seemed to always be around when he needed them, but he could tell there was something off about the whole crew at this point. 

A week and a half after he went missing, the Vagabond rolled around for the first time. Geoff and him had an argument in the living room while Gavin pretended not to listen from the room he had been staying in. He couldn’t help but be reminded of the time he was stuck here last. 

The Vagabond had been hunting any leads on the people that had kidnapped him, and was urging Geoff to put more resources and manpower into the search, but Geoff refused, stating that they should continue lying low until Gavin was healed up completely, and ready to work. 

Gavin’s interest was piqued when a garage was mentioned. 

“I found the house, Geoff. There was blood, a lot.” The living room was silent for a moment, before the Vagabond continued. “It looked like someone died.”

“I get the picture.” Geoff didn’t seem phased. “Was there a body?” 

“Nothing. Just as I told you. Blood, tools, and a chair.” Gavin felt his blood run cold. He didn’t know what this meant. Was the guy dead or alive? 

His head started to hurt after he spent almost an hour thinking about it, and he forced himself to put it out of mind. It became a sort of Schrodinger's cat situation. As long as they didn’t have a body, they didn’t know if the guy was dead. Schrodinger's record of sorts. 

When he had fully recovered, and was now living at home, Michael returned to refusing to leave, sleeping on his couch every night, which was arguably better than the chair that he had slept on for a week.   
They were sitting on said couch together one night, lively conversation between the two of them, when they got a call from Geoff.

“We found him.” Three words. Three words, and Gavin felt cold again. Fearful, he and Michael left the apartment quickly, heading towards the place that Geoff had instructed them to go, a warehouse on the edge of town. One of Ray’s, likely, cleared out for the evening for their use. 

When they pulled up, Michael sat in the car for a moment too long. “Are you good?” He spoke up before Gavin could. 

He took a moment to think of his answer, staring at the metal warehouse in front of them. On the other side of this thin sheet metal, sat the man who had tortured him for hours, the man who he had thought was dead. Another set of nightmares. 

“I didn’t want this..” He said before realizing words were coming out of his mouth. “I don’t want to know how he is, I didn’t want to know if he was dead, or alive. This stupid record has followed me for too long, and I don’t care anymore.” The words wouldn’t stop flowing, and soon he seemed to be spilling his entire life story out to Michael, here, in this car ten feet away from his would-be murderer. 

“Gavin?” Michael interjected, placing a single, placating hand on his shoulder. When he didn’t stop speaking, the hand tightened marginally, and Michael repeated himself. Gavin stopped, not looking at him. He could feel his breath coming too fast. 

“You don’t have to go in.” This caught Gavin’s attention. He hadn’t considered this option. “Geoff only called because he thought that you would want to see him. But if it’s going to bother you more than help you, we’re not going to force you, dude. That’s fucked up.” 

They sat in silence for just a moment, until Gavin shook his head. “I want to finish this.” With that, he got out of the car, and Michael followed suit. As they meet at the front of the car, the hand returned to his shoulder, and squeezed lightly. It was comforting, and for once, Gavin felt no fear. 

They entered the warehouse as one unit, heading towards the Vagabond, who was silhouetted by a single light. He was a terrifying figure, mask dark in the shadows as he loomed over a figure on the ground. Gavin recognized him instantly as he approached. 

“Help, please.” The figured sobbed, weak and broken. The stench of blood was heavy, but he managed to ignore it. He stepped into the light, and the man went silent.   
“He hasn’t talked yet, but he will. Soon.” The Vagabond said, and Gavin nodded. He didn’t move, and the Vagabond took that as his signal to continue his work.

It took another half hour for the man to talk, and when he did, it was a struggle to understand him through the blood in his mouth.

“It was another crew. They have a warehouse on the edge of town. I can take you there, I can work with you, please, just let me go after.” The man begged, and Gavin finally moved. He stepped forward, and fished the switchblade that he had kept since the capture. The blade was now rusted, still red from dried and crusty blood. 

“I don’t know how you survived, and I don’t care.” The man seemed hopeful for a split second, though his eyes kept darting towards the blade. “I won’t make the same mistake.” Gavin said, and cast the blade to the side. Instead, he picked up a pistol from a nearby table, and pointed towards the man’s head. 

He didn’t wait for his hands to shake to pull the trigger. 

The sound rang through the warehouse, and grey ground became red. Gavin stared down the barrel of the gun at the man.

He stared until Michael put his hand back on his shoulder, and squeezed again. 

Only then did he let go of the gun, handing it to the Vagabond, who put the safety on, and put it to the side. His ears still rang, but he felt a weight lifted off of him. 

The record was gone, his reputation was just one of his work now. The man who had hunted him down was dead, and everything was okay for now. 

He knew that they would have to track down this crew, to destroy them from the inside out, but he had confidence that it would seem easy compared to what he had gone through in less than two weeks. 

But now for now, he was done. 

Michael and him left, driving into the night for hours. They drove far beyond the city limits, beyond the desert, until Los Santos was far behind them. 

Gavin didn’t know where they were, but he didn’t care. Michael drove until the sun came up, and then continued driving for a few more hours. They stopped at a gas station, and only then did Gavin let the emotions from the past few hours come out. He drifted into the sand around the gas station, and vomited.

Michael was there, holding a water bottle, and soothingly rubbing his back. “It gets easier.” He said, and Gavin clung to that like a small child to a safety object. 

It gets easier.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey guys, sorry is being updated a little later in the day, I had an exam this morning I was up really late studying for, and then just passed out afterwards. 
> 
> Also, a quick little update on life, as I have in the notes of all my stories, I'm putting myself through college with a little help from my dad usually, but on new years eve, he had a heart attack. He survived, thankfully, but he won't be back at work for a while, and money is pretty tight due to this. I do feel bad for asking, but if any of you have a spare 3 dollars or something, it would be greatly appreciated if you could throw some money my way. Again, totally not required but if you do I will write you a little 1,000 word oneshot or something, just send me an ask or email, the link will be on the donation page <3 https://ko-fi.com/humanwreakage
> 
> Thanks for enjoying this story, this is basically the end, I have an epilogue written that I will post next week, and I've started the sequel but I've gotten a bit sidetracked with another story I'm working on that's still based in the Fake AH Crew setting, but very different circumstances.


	26. Epilogue

Over three years, Gavin and Michael moved in together. It just made sense, given how often they were together. They chose to move into a small house on the outskirts of town, so Michael screaming in frustration wouldn’t get anymore noise complaints, and Gavin could finally adopt a couple animals, much to Michael’s disapproval. The house was perfect for them, with just enough room for the whole crew to sprawl around their living room on nights after heists, becoming a safehouse at times. 

They continued running the town, wiping out the gang that had kidnapped Gavin with ease now that they knew who it was. The crew’s name became feared throughout the city, with the name Golden Boy becoming less of an insult, until he truly didn’t mind it. It became a name that came with the legend of fear, and recklessness. When a van, decked in gold rimmed tires and details, shot through the downtown causing destruction all around it, they knew who it was, but no one said a word to the police when asked. 

Over the three years, somethings did get easier, but there were things that threw a hitch in plans, and Gavin had to recalibrate his life at times. 

The final wrench in the gears came in the late evenings at the end of summer. Michael was lounging on his couch, a beer in hand as they raced each other. Their dynamic would never change, attached at the hip and just as much a part of each other as the other was to them. 

As they finished a race, Gavin took a break to grab another beer, heading towards the kitchen. He grabbed the mail from the counter as he went, flipping through quickly for anything important when he came across a letter that made his heart stop. 

He stood there for far too long, then ripped the letter open, heart racing. Inside, a handwritten letter met him, and he was gripping it so hard he was surprised the paper didn’t rip. 

Clearly written, in handwriting that he would never forget even on his deathbed, was a letter addressed to him. A letter he had been waiting for far too long. 

“Gavin, what the fuck are you doing out there?” Michael asked, irritated and drunk in his warm living room, thousands of miles away from his mind right now. He only was sucked back into real life when he entered the kitchen, and put a hand on his shoulder, looking over it. 

“It’s from Dan.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I ALMOST FORGOT GUYS BUT I DID IT IM SORRY THIS IS SO SO LATE (literally 11:51 pm hhh)
> 
> finally, the end is actually here!! As hinted in this, the sequel will talk more about Gavin and Dan's friendship, and what happened in Gavin's past, and I really hope you subscribe to the series, and keep reading because I'm really excited for this. I'm talking a month or two break to get some writing going again and have a backlog of chapters, but I might post some oneshots here and there from this verse to tide you over. 
> 
> Thank you to PortableHB for your generous donation on my ko-fi last week, it meant so so much to me, I literally cried when I saw it. If you want to get in touch so I can write a oneshot for you, please do not hesitate to comment!!

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first fake ah crew story, but I've been watching them for years, and I'm super excited about this story! Updated every Thursday
> 
> Title and summary quote from Lorde's song Homemade Dynamite which is fake ah crew as shit
> 
> I am putting myself through college rn, so if you have a spare few dollars, maybe toss me a couple bucks for a coffee! http://ko-fi.com/humanwreakage


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